Knight Unexpected - HIATUS
by marcorooni
Summary: Toris Laurinaitis is a knight, hired by the merchant Ivan Braginsky to kidnap people for ransom. Feliks Łukasiewicz is the crown prince of Liathea ... who just happens to be Toris's next victim. Thrown together by unusual circumstances, the two develop an unlikely relationship that shakes the world to its core. [Fantasy AU.] {ON HIATUS AS OF 9-3-17. MORE IN AUTHOR'S NOTE.}
1. Chapter One

**Chapter One**

"Za smutek mój, a pani wdzięk  
Ofiarowałem pani pęk czerwonych melancholii."

-Serce, Marek Grechuta

 **Edit 2-12-16: Got rid of the prologue and changed a few things.**

 **Edit 3-18-16: Changed a few more things, mainly Toris's dialogue. Getting into his headspace is hard as hell. I'll never be completely happy with this chapter, will I? OTL  
**

 **Thanks for checking this fic out. I hope you enjoy reading!**

* * *

Toris had seen plenty of strange things in his seventeen years of life. There was a grove that grew upside down by the west coast, a group of flying pigs somewhere in the mountains, a talking dog in a slum outside of the capital city. Once he even saw a monstrous skeleton, half-human and half-beast, rotting in the desert. But not a single one of those things compared to the sight of the crown prince Feliks Łukasiewicz painting his toenails in bed.

After he slipped into the Prince's bedroom through the balcony, sweating and silently exhausted, Toris noticed that the nail polish was ruby red.

It wasn't that it was weird. Toris had seen plenty of men who wore make up before. His own brother, Raivis, did. too Blush here and there, mascara on occasion… It was just unexpected. The crown prince, Feliks Łukasiewicz … with red nail polish? The same crown prince who was depicted as being the manliest man in the kingdom?

(Well. That explained why the Crown Prince always wore gloves in public.)

Toris entered the bedroom.

The crown prince stared at him.

For a moment, the only sound in the room was the night breeze and swishing curtains.

The crown prince was the one who broke the silence. "Hey, what the hell?" He said, with a quiver in his voice. "Who are you?"

His hands were trembling. Some of the nail polish dripped down from the brush, staining the stark white sheets in a way that was eerily reminiscent of blood.

"U-um-" Toris began, and then stopped. Stuttering? Why was he stuttering? He shouldn't have stuttered. Maybe it was the cold… no, no. Swallowing thickly to compose himself, Toris unsheathed his sword and pointed it at the crown prince's throat.

"Let's go." He said, with a steady voice and leveled gaze.

"What?"

The crown prince's voice echoed across the room. Toris continued to stare straight at him, green eyes on green.

"You're coming with me."

That strategy worked with most people. Too scared to do anything else, they would either submit immediately or fight until their last breath. Toris suspected that the crown prince was part of the first category. Feliks Łukasiewicz, with his delicate frame, did not seem like he could hold up against a well-placed punch. Then again, he wasn't very sure. This prince was wild; this prince was unpredictable. That's what Ivan Zimavich said, anyways. If he was smart (or a coward), he would go quietly. Like all of the others.

(He hoped that he would. There were many things that Toris could do without regret, but harming the crown prince was not one of them.)

The crown prince did neither. Instead, he continued to stare.

"This is illegal." He said slowly, like he was speaking to an idiot. (And maybe Toris was one.) His shoulders were tense. The crown prince looked back at his feet. The nail polish was beginning to dry – he sped up the process by blowing on them. "This is illegal. You know that, right?"

Scared. The crown prince was so, so scared. The signs were as recognizable to him as the sound of his brother's voice. Tense shoulders, quivering hands, a voice that tried to stay neutral. Pity chipped at his heart.

Fear was a ghost that never left. Fear was something that you never forgot. A wisp of a thought flickered through Toris's mind, barely a whisper.

 _What if I let him go free?_

Scared. Scared. The crown prince was so scared. Toris was like that once.

Without warning, Ivan Zimavich's parting words floated to the front of his mind:

 _"If you mess up, Toris, there will be no consequences for you. All will be good. All will be forgiven. Your brothers love you, da? They will be more than happy to take up the consequences."_

He remembered the warning, remembered Raivis's wide eyes and Eduard's gentle smile, and his heart turned to stone.

"Don't make me have to do this," he said, barely able to keep himself from pleading. He inched the sword closer to the crown prince. The other inhaled sharply. "Don't make me. Please. Just come with me."

The crown prince considered.

"No."

Toris dug the tip of the sword into the crown prince's cheek. With a sick sensation rolling in his stomach he watched as the blade cut into flesh and the blood started dripping down the crown prince's cheek. The emotions on the other's face were hard to pinpoint.

"Fuckyou," the crown prince breathed out, all at once.

"It doesn't have to be like this." Another almost plea.

The crown prince's laugh was as sharp as a knife.

"Well, same to you. Get this sword off of my face."

"Perhaps we can talk if you cooperate."

The crown prince laughed humorlessly.

Toris dug the blade deeper into the crown prince's face. He hissed in anger.

"What? Are you just going to cut my face up until I get up and go with you? Ha! Good luck! I'd like to see you try getting me out of this bed."

Toris said nothing. The crown prince rolled his eyes.

"Some knight you are."

A lump formed in Toris's throat. He dug the sword even deeper into the crown prince's face. The boy's eyes widened.

"You wouldn't dare." He hissed, pressing his palms onto the bed.

A plea and a question all at once.

"I will." Toris replied quietly. "Unless you come with me."

"And what if I don't want to?"

A stupid question. They both knew the answer.

Toris kept the sword on the crown prince. It did the opposite of what he intended. Instead of making the crown prince's face grow heavy with resignation, Toris watched as the crown prince's face went through a subtle change of emotion – a raised brow, a furrowed eyebrow, a sharp look – before completely masking itself.

A battle of wits. Right. Toris could play that game.

After slowly capping his nail polish, careful not spill any of the liquid, the crown prince stood up and stretched luxuriously. His hands were still trembling, Toris noticed. The only difference was that now they were clenched into fists, nails digging into the palms. Was that a tiny stream of blood sliding down his wrist, or was that nail polish? Toris was half-relieved and half-disgusted with himself.

(Lord forgive him. Imagine if that was Raivis.)

He almost thought that there was going to be no need for a fight. That the crown prince would give in quietly, letting himself be taken away to God knows where. That was how they all went.

He was wrong. With his green eyes cat eyes locked onto Toris's face, Feliks Łukasiewicz broke away from the sword. Then screamed and rammed Toris straight in the chest.

All of the wind left his body. They fell to the floor; Toris's sword slid out of his hands and skidded towards the bed, clattering all the way. At that moment, he cursed the castle's stone floors and the thin fabric of his shirt. He was aware of his arms scraping on the flood and another thing, warm and cold at the same time – blood. It ran down onto his lip, leaving a metallic taste in his mouth. The crown prince was straddling his hip and had punched him on the nose.

The world became a hazy, woozy mess. Toris had never been in a situation like it before, not in all of his many years of experience. He's on top of me, Toris realized, after the crown prince threw another punch at him – his shoulder, maybe, or his nose again (he couldn't tell) -, and if I don't move, I'm going to die. So he did the only thing that he could think of, a dirty tactic a real knight was never supposed to use; he reached up, grabbed a fist full of the Crown Prince's hair, and yanked.

The crown prince cried out. With this split-second distraction Toris was able to throw him off. Feliks Łukasiewicz, as it turned out, was not such a light weight after all. He filed the information away for later use. In the confusion – the Crown Prince hissing in pain, blood everywhere – he reached out and grabbed his sword by the hilt, struggling to keep a firm grip on it. Toris stood up, legs trembling. The blood rushed to his head. He wiped his nose and grimaced as the side of his hand turned red.

The crown prince was standing, sniffling. Toris thought that he was crying. Then he caught a glimpse of those green eyes, narrowed into slits, and he realized that the prince was ready to tackle him again.

Thinking, thinking, thinking. There was no time to think. Toris rushed forward and slammed the butt of his sword into the crown prince's chest, just light enough to make him fall over. There was a gasp, a sudden loss of all words – and then a shriek as the Prince fell over, grazing his head against the sharp corner of a bedside table. A thin rivulet of blood stained his hair.

"Forgive me." Toris whispered, though to who he didn't know; the gods, maybe? Or the crown prince? That boy is not much older than I am, he thought. A fighter, too. Look – he's starting to get up again.

The crown prince was coughing. He spit. A glob of red landed on the carpet. Nonetheless he tried to stand, gripping the bedside table until his knuckles turned white.

They stared at each other, green meeting green, with an animosity that was suffocating.

"Forgive me." Toris whispered again, before rushing forward and slamming the butt of his sword into the crown prince's chest, hard.

The crown prince fell. He did not get up.

* * *

 _A knight_ , Toris read in the history books, is _someone who honors the values of chivalry._ And _chivalry_ , according to the dictionary, is _the combination of qualities expected of an ideal knight, especially courage, honor, courtesy, justice, and a readiness to help the weak._ From then on Toris knew that he wanted to be a knight. A knight wearing armor and riding on horseback with a big sword – what could be better than that? What could be better than helping someone?

Ivan Zimavich called him a knight. Eduard and Raivis called him a knight. But Toris never considered himself one. He never would. A knight was not someone who took for a living. A knight was not someone who hurt others.

A knight was not someone who kidnaps people for ransom.

He didn't like to talk about it. It was something that, over the course of many years, had been managed to be buried in the back of Toris's mind, along with a slew of other thoughts. It was a thought that did not _need_ to be discussed. It hurt. It hurt, being called a knight when he wasn't one, and Ivan Zimavich used it to his advantage.

 _My little wolf,_ he would purr whenever Toris came home with a new victim. _My little knight._

Don't call me that, Toris hissed, but never aloud. Not with Raivis and Eduard in the same house. Not when he could put them in danger.

He didn't think about it much. He _tried_ not to think about it much. But as Toris dragged the crown prince away from the castle at the dead of night he couldn't help but to think about it. He thought about how Ivan Zimavich purred when he came home, and how Raivis and Eduard's eyes grew wide whenever he came home with new books for them, and he tried not to laugh.

 _A knight is someone who helps people._

Some knight he was.

* * *

 **Hi, hello, I am here.**

 **Okay, first of all, forgive me for that awful fight scene up there jfc. It's my first time writing one. Please leave some constructive criticism on that because I am literally dying just reading it oh my god.**

 **Uh. What else? Oh! Yes. Bad Blood will be updated sometime soon. The tumblr tag for that fic is fic: bad blood, by the way, just in case you want to tag me in something. Knight Unexpected has a tag, too. It's fic: knight unexpected. You can also ask me questions about both fics on my tumblr (nonbinarymage).**

 **Thank you for the reviews and follows, by the way! You guys rock. See y'all later! \ o /**

 **-NC**

 **Edited 2-12-16 and 3-18-16.**


	2. Chapter Two

Chapter Two

 **Hey hey! I thought I'd put this bit of the author's note at the beginning, just because this is important and I'd like to know if anyone is interested. Anyways:**

 **Would anyone be interested in being a beta for this fic? This fic is going to be fight scene heavy, and it would be very helpful to have a beta who could look over them with a critical eye. I also need help with characterization, pacing, and mood, particularly pacing. If anyone is interested, send me a PM. Thank you!**

 **(Is it weird to ask for betas in author's notes like this? OTL I apologize if it is. I haven't asked for a beta reader before.)**

 **Thank you for reading this! The rest of the author's note is at the end. I hope you enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

"Hey, don't tell me you're losing motivation now! Suck it up and deal with it, Boris!"

"I'm not losing motivation –"

"Oh, shut up! Stop moping back there or else I'll be forced to kick your ass."

Toris grit his teeth. He drew his knees closer to his chest, narrowed his eyes, and sent a tired look in the direction of Gilbert Beilschmidt.

Why Ivan Zimavich decided to send _Gilbert_ – or Nikolay, if one wanted to call him by his code name - to help with the mission was beyond him. Gilbert of all people…! Their fights were notorious amongst Ivan Zimavich's "knights". There was also the fact that he was tall enough attract attention, and that his white hair never fully faded, even with the help of Irunya's brown hair dye. Still, Toris had to (grudgingly) admit one thing: Gilbert Beilschmidt had strength and charm. He was the one thing that the mission needed most.

Toris took a deep breath and settled closer to the side of the wagon. His legs ached and his stomach pulsed with hunger and something more. Truth be told, he would rather have gone on foot in his current condition than to have gone on a wagon ride with Gilbert, but there was no second choice. It was his job to deal with any situation as smoothly as possible. He wasn't going to complain about it. Not when it could start an argument. Not when the crown prince was directly underneath him.

They looked like normal merchants travelling back from the castle, but in reality, the crown prince was lying inside one of the long wooden boxes that acted as the wagon's benches. And that's what worried Toris. His stomach writhed as he thought about how the crown prince was there, unconscious and in the dark. Even though his lips and eyes were covered, what if someone were to stop them? What if he woke up? He would put the entire mission in harm's way. It would put Ivan Zimavich in harm's way. It would put his entire life in harm's way.

It would put his _brothers_ in harm's way.

The thought of his brothers worried him the most. How were they now? Toris wondered. Were they eating well? Were they comfortable? If they were, that was alright. It was better than alright – it was perfect. If they weren't… if they weren't, what was he even doing here?

A long dirt road stretched as far as the eye could see surrounded by stalks and stalks of light green grass, gently swaying in the wind. The same breeze tickled the back of Toris's neck. The day was as perfect as could be, and yet he couldn't shake the squirming from his stomach. He sighed and tried to ignore the discomfort, focusing on two things:

The thought of his brothers. He had to get through the mission for them. If he could accomplish it, he would be able to die happy.

Gilbert.

"I thought I told you to stop moping."

Gilbert's voice cut through the thick summer haze. Toris aimed another look at the back of his head.

"I am _not_ moping." He stated firmly. He placed a hand on his carrier bag and squeezed tightly. The apple inside of it asked to be eaten and the core to be thrown at Gilbert's head after, but it was something that he was saving for desperate situations. "Please stop saying that I am."

"'Please stop saying that I am.'" Gilbert mocked in a whiny, high-pitched voice.

"Ah, Gilbert…"

"Seriously, you're such a pussy! Put your game face on and think about what we have to do! No one got anywhere by moping around and feeling sorry for themselves!"

Toris sat up straight. "Are you seriously telling me this? I – "

"Look," Gilbert snapped, "if you want to be great, be great! But you can't do it while you're sitting around like a depressed sack of flour."

Gilbert tugged on the reins. Toris lurched forward. A shock of adrenaline went through him; the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. He yelped and pressed a palm against the bench.

"Be careful!" Hair got into his eye. Toris shook it away and tucked it behind his ear with his free hand. "The crown prince might – "

"The crown prince might what? Wake up? Please! He's as asleep as a log! No one will ever make it through us!" Nonetheless Gilbert slowed the horse down, something Toris was immensely grateful for. "We'll be fine, Boris. Stop your worrying. It's not something that makes you look manly at all. It just makes you look like a wimp."

Gilbert had a point, but his confidence would be the death of him. Of both of them. Toris opened his mouth to speak when, suddenly, his were interrupted when a sound came from behind them, loud and clear as day – a sound that was instantly recognizable.

Talking.

A conversation.

Humans.

Toris whipped his head around.

"Eh?" Gilbert asked, turning his head around, "what're you saying? I can't hear you because you're so– "

Toris shushed him.

Gilbert inhaled sharply.

Guards. Palace guards. There were two of them, both on horseback and both tall. The tallest one wore a plum red feather on his helmet, a feather that only head guards were allowed to wear. He gestured while talking to his companion, a slender figure wearing a navy blue cloak. The two were complete opposites. Red and blue; tall and short; unruly strawberry blond hair and neat platinum blond. And they were heading straight towards them.

Toris paled. Instinctively, his hand went to his sword. He shared a knowing look with Gilbert.

"It will be alright." He whispered, glancing back from the two guards to Gilbert. "Just keep calm. Do as I say."

Gilbert huffed, but he nodded along anyways. As Toris stepped off of the wagon to meet the guards, he hoped that he would make it out of the encounter alive.

Gilbert was the first to greet them. He swaggered towards the two while they were getting off of their horses, his eyebrows furrowed together in annoyance. "Eh? What is the problem here?"

"Eh! See, Sigurd? I told you that these guys didn't look so bad!" One of the guards, presumably the head judging by the badge on his chest, exclaimed. A glistening silver axe hung by his side. He flashed a smile at Toris and Gilbert, friendly and full of life. Toris smiled back, light and cautious. "See? This one is cool. I like him already!"

Sigurd ran a pale hand over his face. "You're such an idiot, you know that?" His violet eyes bored their way into Gilbert's skull. "You trust anything that comes your way."

"Oh, now you're just being dramatic." The head guard slapped Sigurd's back. Sigurd didn't flinch. "What's the point in being cold? Ya gotta make friends, Sig! There's no use in being cold and depressed all day."

"Whatever." Gilbert interrupted, crossing his arms. "Get to the point. We don't have all day here, you know!"

The head guard flinched. "Sheesh! Okay, okay! Sorry to hold you guys up, but there was an incident at the castle today. We gotta search your wagon, okay?"

Gilbert cocked his head to the side.

"What's the matter?" Toris asked, sliding up besides Gilbert. Sigurd pursed his lips.

"The crown prince," he said – and here he closed his eyes– "has gone missing."

" _What?_ "

Gilbert's eyes bulged. "He went missing? Eh? What type of security do you guys have in that castle? How could you lose a prince? What kind of incompetent –"

Toris nudged Gilbert's shoulder before the situation could get any worse. "Oh, yes!" He chipped in, moving aside to let the guards through. "Yes, please do! Take as long as you'd like. Is there anything else that I can do to help?"

"Heyyy, that's the spirit!" The head guard laughed and patted Toris on the shoulder. "Just clear out your wagon for us and then you guys can leave! We'll be as quick as possible, promise! Where are you guys going?"

"Ach, a few towns over. No biggie. We're going to sell our wares so fast that they'll be gone like this!" Gilbert snapped his fingers. "We've been doing this for a while. What do you expect from the masters?"

 _Gilbert really shines in situations like this_ … Toris noted, upon seeing Mathias's star-struck eyes. Honestly, he wouldn't be surprised if he got a part time job with a theatre troupe. The guards seemingly bought into it without question. In fact, Mathias was ready to ask another question when Sigurd put a hand on his shoulder.

"Mathias." Sigurd exhaled slowly. "The wagon."

"Oh! Right! Yeah, off you two go!" And Mathias pushed Gilbert and Toris towards the wagon.

"Ach! What dumbasses!" Gilbert hissed, once Mathias and Sigurd ambled to the front of the wagon. "Can you believe it? They bought into it. And they thought that we were actually merchants! And they lost the _prince_? Please! The palace has really gone to shit. I think that if we just went over there and – "

"That doesn't matter right now, Nikolay." Toris whispered back. "We have to figure out what to do about _him_."

Gilbert snorted. He grabbed a sack of flour from the wagon and slid it onto the ground. Toris followed. His muscles ached from the exertion. "Like they'll find them! If they can't even keep a prince, how are they going to find one?"

"We must figure out how to do _something_. I don't want to see Ivan Zimavich's reaction if we're arrested…"

Toris shuddered. He'd hate to think of it. Ivan Zimavich, cold as ice, walking towards the closet door and… no. He wouldn't think of it.

Apparently, Gilbert thought the same thing. He brought his eyebrows together and pursed his lips.

"What if we do something right now?"

"Right now?"

"What else do you suggest?" Gilbert asked, sarcasm dripping off of his voice.

"An escape while they're still standing? It makes no sense."

"…You're right." Gilbert muttered darkly. Toris felt a hint of satisfaction grow in his chest, though he quickly drove it down when he saw Sigurd give him a long look that was completely unreadable. "What if we knocked them out now? We could do it."

"And leave them here injured? We can't do that!"

"We have no other option, do we?"

Toris chanced a look at Gilbert. He was frowning and his hands trembled nervously. Oh… he couldn't help but feel bad about it. After all, he used to feel the same way. With a sigh, Toris rubbed his wrists and attempted to diffuse the situation.

"We must do something. He cannot be discovered."

"Yeah, but who says that they'll even discover him in the first place?"

"They've been talking for a while."

"Calm down! You're just worrying your socks off. Get more confidence, Boris. We'll be fine. No one can ever beat me. Ever." Gilbert straightened his back and wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. "We'll be fine. Just stop being such a pussy."

Toris shrugged. "Nikolay…"

Gilbert's eye twitched.

Toris gulped.

"If you say so."

When the sacks of flour were off of the wagon, Sigurd poked at the bottoms with his lance while Mathias happily chopped off the tops with an axe. When he saw Gilbert's sour expression, Mathias smiled sympathetically.

"The kingdom will pay you back, don't worry about it." He hummed and sifted through another sack of flour, chopping up the burlap sack in the process. Toris winced. Oh, if only Mathias knew how much waste he was creating… those sacks of flour could have made enough bread to feed the entire family for months! "Is this all of your guys' stuff?"

Gilbert hmphed. "It was until you destroyed it all."

Mathias nodded vigorously. He turned away from Gilbert and addressed Toris, placing his hands on his hips. "You sure you guys got nothin' else on your wagon?"

Toris's thoughts drifted to the crown prince. "Yes." He said, slowly and deliberately. "There's nothing else. Feel free to check if you'd like."

Sigurd began to poke underneath the wagon. Mathias followed behind him. Just watching them made Toris's stomach queasy. They went slowly, not leaving a single inch of wood untouched.

"…This wood is awfully thick." Sigurd commented. His voice had the same monotonous tone as when he first spoke.

The inability to read Sigurd's mind only set Toris more on edge. "Ah, yes." Toris loosened his shoulders and tried to laugh. "You see, where we come from the roads are incredibly bumpy, so we've had to make our wagons durable for long trips."

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Mathias smacked the side of the wagon with his axe. Toris almost screamed. He held his breath, counting the seconds in stifling silence. One second, then two and three – nothing. Gilbert hmphed in satisfaction as the two moved on, his sour expression turning smug.

"Where do you two come from?" Sigurd asked after a beat of silence.

Toris cleared his throat. "The north part of the country. Mountain district."

Sigurd raised his eyebrow. "You come all the way down here for business?"

"The prices are better down here. There are a lot of farms where we live and not so many in the city, so we come down here to sell every once in a while."

"Right. Names?"

"Boris Ivanov, sir. My friend is Nikolay Orlov.

Sigurd made a noise in the back of his throat. He asked for their addresses (Toris gave them the location of an abandoned home where he used to train with Ivan Zimavich in the mountains), their parents' names (fake), where their shop was (also fake), and proceeded to write it down in a leather-bound notebook. Toris clasped his hands together and tried not to make his worry noticeable.

At long last Mathias and Sigurd finished their search. Mathias ambled over towards them while Sigurd lingered behind to inspect the wagon one last time. Toris struggled to keep his eyes on Mathias. "Sorry for the diversion! Kingdom rules. We'll let you two get going now. Boris Ivanov and Nikolay Orlov, right?"

"That's right, sir." Toris replied.

Mathias smiled brightly, though Toris noticed something odd. His hand was wrapped tightly around the handle of his axe. "We'll call on you guys if we need anything more. Reimbursement should come in the mail. It was great meeting ya!"

Sigurd slid to Mathias's side. His eyes were unfocused, as if he was thinking deeply about something. "Good day."

While Gilbert went back to the front of the horse, Toris shifted in his spot and flicked his eyes between the guards's retreating backs. They were paying him no mind. Mathias slung an arm around Sigurd's neck; Sigurd swatted the arm, but made to move to get it off. The familiarity sent a flutter through Toris's heart.

Their act was safe (for now), so why couldn't he stop the sensation rising in his stomach? It wrapped its lead fingers around his heart and _squeezed_ , just enough to stutter his breathing. They were safe. They were fine. The crown prince would be alright. And yet there was a weight on his heart, something that pressed down and set his mind ablaze.

As he climbed onto the back of the wagon, head abuzz, the feeling reached into his chest and yanked deeper, deeper. It practically suffocated him until he was holding his breath, though he couldn't figure out _why_. What was the matter? Was it a premonition? He settled onto the side of the cart, drawing his knees close to him. There was nothing wrong and yet he could not let his guard down. Something was going to happen, he just knew it, and –

And that's when it happened. That's when Toris heard it, coming from just beneath him.

 _Thunk._

Sigurd's head whipped back.

"LET ME OUT!" cried the crown prince, banging his fists against the box. "THIS IS TOTALLY UNFAIR! LET ME _OUT!_ "

 _Thunk. Thunk. Thunk._ It was just like the sound of Toris's heart, beating at a rapid fire pace against the wood. The blood rushed to his ears.

 _Thunk. Thunk. Thunk._

There was no way Mathias and Sigurd couldn't have heard that.

Gilbert was the first to react. He yanked at the horse's reins, moving the wagon at a rapid trot. Mathias and Sigurd were quicker. Without wagons or sacks of flour behind them, their horses caught up with Gilbert's in an instant. They flanked either side of the wagon with their weapons drawn: Mathias with his glistening axe and Sigurd with his lance.

The wagon was stopped. There was no going back.

Toris stood up. His legs were shaking. He withdrew his sword and aimed it at Mathias, who smiled at him with all teeth bared. It was not friendly. It was the same vicious smile that Ivan Zimavich taught him to have – a vicious smile that he could never do correctly, no matter how hard he tried. The thought made his throat swell and suddenly, all of the words were gone.

"I knew it." came Sigurd's voice from the right. The sound of it sent a shiver through Toris's body. He swallowed and moved towards the middle of the wagon, close to the end.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. The crown prince continued to pound against the box, so hard that the bench vibrated.

Mathias laughed. "Nikolay Orlov and Boris Ivanov! Those aren't your real names, are they?"

"Piss off." Gilbert snapped from the front of the wagon. "Leave us alone already! You're done with your inspection!"

"Leave you two alone? Why would we do that?" Mathias tilted his head to the side. "Oh, we aren't leaving you two alone."

"MATHIAS?" The crown prince's voice floated up from the compartment. "IS THAT YOU? YOU HAVE TO, LIKE, HELP ME!"

The pounding grew stronger. Sigurd's pale lips twisted upward into a cold smirk.

"Nikolay Orlov and Boris Ivanov, you are under arrest for the abduction of the crown prince of Liathea, Feliks Łukasiewicz."

The next moments happened in a blur.

Mathias and Sigurd dismounted their horses and ran to the back of the wagon. Gilbert met Toris at the back of the wagon, breathing heavily, sword drawn. "Sword up! We're screwed if we don't win this!"

The horse whinnied and lurched to the side of the road. The wagon swayed from side to side, causing Toris's stomach to curl.

 _Thunk thunk. Thunk thunk. Thunk thunk._ The pounding grew frantic as the crown prince writhed and screamed.

"Nikolay!" Toris barked, pointing his sword at Sigurd. "The horse!"

"Screw the horse! Focus on Mathias! He's the one with the must brute strength. I've got Sigurd, you just –"

Before Gilbert could finish his sentence, Toris found himself face to face with Mathias. His eyes were full of determination, locked onto Toris's, and before he could comprehend he was swinging the great axe.

Toris caught the axe with his sword. The metal clang shook him to his very bones. On his right side, Gilbert was cursing, moving his feet back and forth in a frantic, volatile dance with Sigurd. Toris did the same. He met Mathias's strokes and pushed forward, determined to get him away from the wagon. He could not – would not – lose to Mathias, not to a palace guard. Ivan Zimavich depended on it. His life depended on it. His _brothers_ depended on it.

Mathias was vicious. He swung his axe fiercely, forcing Toris to parry and keep his feet moving. Move. Move. Move. He swung at Toris's chest; Toris just barely met it with his sword. Mathias shoved him forward, forcing him to get closer to the wagon.

Another swing. Mathias got his shoulder, forming a deep gash. He cried out, the pain welling up and bringing tears to his eyes.

 _Clink. Clink. Clink._ The clanging rang in his ears. Toris gasped as Mathias almost landed a hit on him. He stepped back, breathing shallow, and –

The hilt of the great axe just barely met the blade of Toris's sword. The impact was strong enough to send him down to the ground, bones rattling.

On the other side of him, Gilbert yelled out. Sigurd had jabbed him in the chest, hard. He fell to the ground, gasping for breath, and clutched his hand to his chest. It was stained red.

Sigurd kicked him in the side. He struggled to move.

 _Kick. Kick. Kick._

Gilbert coughed up blood. He collapsed to the ground and did not move.

Mathias staggered towards Toris. Toris's breathing became heavier.

He could not die. He could _not_ die! Mathias descended upon him like a vulture to the carcass, ready for its next meal, but Toris would not, could not let them kill him. His vision blurred. He stood up, holding out his sword with shaky arms. It was too late – it was far too late. No matter how he slashed or jabbed, Mathias was relentless. He jabbed back twice as hard and soon Toris found himself backed up against the very edge of the wagon, panting for breath.

Mathias's eyes glistened. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Toris rooted his feet to the ground and continued to hold up his sword. His eyes glanced back and forth, desperate for a way out – and then he saw it, just out of the corner of his eye.

Gilbert was starting to regain consciousness, twitching imperceptibly. Sigurd was unaware. He kept his eyes glued on Gilbert, but the signs were so barely visible that they were unnoticeable. Toris's eyes went back to Mathias. The blond was raising his axe high above his head for the final skull-shattering injury.

Without thinking, Toris ducked his head and sidestepped, causing Mathias to embed his axe deep within the wagon. And then, when he was still in shock, Toris took his sword and slashed him across the abdomen.

A spray of bright red blood stained the wagon and Toris's clothes. Mathias choked and fell to the ground. Sigurd screamed. All thoughts of Gilbert forgotten he rushed at Toris, lance drawn, eyes wide and teeth bared. They danced around each other, beautiful and deadly, and twice Toris felt Sigurd's lance snake by his back and chest.

 _Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh._ Toris's feet dragged. Twice more he felt Sigurd's lance almost puncture him; twice more he felt the lance take off a bit of clothing. Sigurd was vicious. There was nothing but fury in his eyes. He stepped side to side, moving Toris back further and further, completely dead to the world around him, completely dead to the road, completely dead to the sky. Completely dead to Mathias's groans of pain.

Completely dead to the fact that Gilbert Beilschmidt was coming behind him with a sword in his hand.

A burst of red appeared on the dirt as Sigurd fell face forward. Toris stepped back and _retched_. With shaky hands, he sheathed his sword and jogged back to the wagon to vomit, the mental image of Sigurd lying face down on the floor fresh in his mind – only to compose himself and swallow it down. The bile rose up in his throat. The mental image remained imprinted on the back of his eyelids: Sigurd, falling onto the road, with Gilbert Beilschmidt triumphant and blood-soaked above him.

He didn't mean for the day to end like this. He didn't mean for anything to happen. Ivan Zimavich would be upset. No, more than upset; he would be _furious_. The thought sent Toris into a downwards spiral. His mind became a whirlwind of possibilities. Suppose the news got around; suppose Ivan Zimavich found out before Toris could deliver the crown prince; suppose Ivan Zimavich punished Eduard and Raivis. Suppose _he_ was the one who hurt his own brothers.

Toris took a seat on the wagon, shuddering, head coming to rest in his hands.

Breath. In. Out. Right.

He could do it. He could…

A hand came to rest on his shoulder. Toris turned around. Sure enough it was Gilbert, lips tight, jaw tense.

"We need to go."

His voice was hoarse. The puncture wound in his chest bled sticky red, staining Irunya's coarse brown merchant's cloak. He leaned on the wagon and coughed once, twice.

Toris swallowed thickly.

"No. I need to go."

" _What?_ "

Toris's head spun. Putting two hands on the wagon for stabilization, he glanced back at Sigurd and Mathias. They were both unconscious on the road, and for a moment, Toris was grateful that Gilbert was as brutal as he was. The situation was better than if they were alive." I need to go alone, Nikolay."

"What? You're going without me? You're an idiot! No one can go without me! And you're _bleeding_!"

That was true. Toris's wounds stung, and if he didn't get medical help in the next hours, an infection would surely set in. He shook his head anyways. "I will take some of the medical supplies. You will take the other half. We'll meet in Ivan Zimavich's house. If I'm not there within a week, look for me."

" _Eh_? Last time I checked, it was _our_ mission, not yours! Who do you think you are? Do you think that you can order me around and tell me what to do just because you're Zimavich's favorite?"

" _I am not his favorite_." Toris bristled. He grabbed the hilt of his sword.

Gilbert rolled his eyes. "Admit it. You're a kiss ass to him."

"I am the mission leader." Toris said slowly, unsheathing the first inch of the sword. Gilbert stumbled back. "It is your job to do what I say, even if I _am_ younger than you. And right now, I say that we should split up. Mathias and Sigurd will report back to the palace. If we split up, we can have two groups to look for – you and me – instead of just one."

Gilbert considered. He shifted his weight onto his right foot and crossed his arms haughtily. "Where are you going?"

"To the back roads. The main roads would be too risky." Without waiting for another word, Toris set his sword down, stepped onto the wagon, and opened the bench.

The crown prince was writhing on the floor. Thankfully, his blindfold and the rest of his bindings were still intact. His voice was muffled but audible, and Toris sincerely wished that it wasn't – he didn't need to deal with the talking. In fact, he wished that he didn't have to deal with _any_ of this. Leaving Gilbert meant leaving the wagon, and leaving the wagon… meant travelling on foot.

His injuries. How would he deal with his injuries?

The crown prince's face was pinched and flushed. "Don't touch me!" He hissed when Toris grabbed him by the shoulders. "Get your hands off of me!"

"Need help, Boris?" Gilbert called out weakly. Toris shook his head. With a sigh, he wrapped his arms around the crown prince and lifted him up.

The crown prince fought violently, struggling all the way as Toris lifted him over his uninjured shoulder. It was just as – if not more – painful than carrying him on the injured one. The crown prince slammed his arms against Toris's back; he kicked his legs against Toris's thighs. The injuries throbbed violently, but Toris would not move. Once he stumbled off the wagon he set off north, Gilbert trampling the blood-stained grass behind him.

"Fine, fine. Just go and die without me, I could care less. When will we meet again?" Gilbert asked.

The crown prince was still screaming. Toris glanced at him, his blond hair and lithe shoulders.

"I don't know." He admitted. He shifted his eyes back to Mathias and Sigurd, both of whom were lying prone and defenseless on the ground. The sight squeezed his heart. "It will take a while, but I must go. The guards – "

"Right, right, I know. I'm not stupid. Go on, Boris. Be safe."

"You too, Nikolay. I wish you luck."

There was a pause. After a moment of silence, Gilbert screwed his eyes shut and pressed his forehead to Toris's. His breath was close to his face; his eyes were closed and his eyebrows were screwed together. The action, in a way, reminded him of his brothers. How they would beg Toris to never leave the house if he had to. The action, in a way, made his heart ache terribly.

The moment lasted for a second. The crown prince screamed and continued to struggle.

And then it was gone.

Toris looked at the world around him. The wagon, Sigurd and Mathias laying prone on the ground… the robin's egg blue sky. The grass, stretching as far as the eye could see, and Gilbert. Gilbert Beilschmidt. It would be the last time they would see each other for a while. That much he knew.

The decision took a moment to think about.

"Put your hand out."

"What?"

Gilbert slowly turned his hand out. Toris nodded. And then, out of his carrier bag, he took out the apple and pressed it to Gilbert's palm.

"This is your apple." Gilbert said. He held it to the light and squinted. "And you're giving it to me?"

"You need it more than I do."

"Oh, please." Gilbert scoffed. He didn't give it back. Instead, he tucked it deep within his own carrier bag. "Thank you, I suppose."

Toris straightened his shoulders."Good luck, Nikolay."

"Good luck, Boris. Don't make any stupid ass mistakes, you hear me?" Gilbert slapped Toris's uninjured shoulder. "See ya later."

"Goodbye."

They shared one last look. A wary _don't die; I'll see you soon._ And with that, Toris turned around and began to run.

* * *

 **First of all: holy _SHIT!_ 14 faves, 17 follows, and 7 reviews on Chapter One alone! There aren't enough words to describe how thankful I am for all of your support. At first I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue this fic, so I'm glad that Chapter One was well received. I hope that Chapter Two lives up to your expectations!**

 **(If it doesn't, don't feel afraid to tell me so. I'm not completely satisfied with this chapter, so any constructive criticism is welcome.)**

 **Second of all: I know all of you are probably waiting for Toris and Feliks to interact properly. I _promise_ you that they will next chapter. This was just setting things up for later in the story.**

 **Third of all: I'm looking for beta readers, as you all know from the first author's note. If you're interested, PM me. Thank you!**

 **Fourth of all: Thank you all _so_ much for the amazing reviews you've left, as well as all of the follows and favorites. I have big things in mind for this fic, so I can't wait to get started on writing Chapter Three. As for when I'll be able to update next, I don't know. I'm tentatively setting the date for mid to late June, but if it's not then, it'll be in August. My family is going on a trip in July, so I'll be able to get a lot of writing done then.**

 **Anyways, that's the end of this author's note. Have a great day and, as always, I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter of Knight Unexpected!**

 **-NC**

 **tumblr: nonbinarymage**

 **fic tag: fic: knight unexpected**


	3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three

* * *

So Toris ran. And he ran. And he ran.

He ran past the stalks of wild grass, past the sun that climbed ever higher, past the blood on the wagon and the crumpled bodies of Sigurd and Mathias. With every step his legs burned and his injuries throbbed painfully, but not once did he allow himself to stop. His breathing came in hot, thick bursts; sweat beaded between his brow and on his neck. The midday sun turned his face red. But he never allowed himself to stop, not even when the crown prince kicked and screamed and cried.

At last, when he was certain that he was far away from Gilbert and the main road and the blood, Toris stopped. He took hold of the crown prince and gently lowered him onto the grass.

And then he collapsed.

The summer breeze was no comfort to him now. How could he rest when there was the possibility that he killed two men? If anyone from the castle caught him, he'd be dead before nightfall. How could he rest when there was blood on his fingertips? It was dark red and refused to leave no matter how many times Toris ran his fingers through the grass and his shirt. (Somehow, that made it even worse.) How could he rest when he left Gilbert behind – dense, arrogant Gilbert, too proud for his own good? Gilbert had charm, but... His arrogance could get him into trouble. Would he survive? And, more importantly… would Toris Laurinaitis survive?

He wasn't so sure. Toris panted and dug his fingers into the grass, still sticky sweet with dew. If his sense of direction was correct, he was in the western plains. He travelled through them on his scouting mission a few months prior. The plains were dotted with abandoned barns and back roads, and if he continued west, he would be able to hide in the barns and slowly make his way up to the city of Aphesia. Then would come the valleys, and the forests, and after that…

Ivan Zimavich. The waiting. Their house in the mountains, with its pine floors and stone cellar deep underground. And the ransom. There was always the ransom.

1,000,000 pieces of gold. The heftiest price yet.

But that was not something to think about. What he needed to do was bandage his injuries and run. Toris breathed. There was nothing but the endless sea of grass as far as the eye could see, and the robin's egg blue sky and the burning midday sun, and, when he lifted his eyes up, he noticed.

The crown prince.

Toris coughed up a thick god of red before dragging himself into sitting position. His eyes watered and struggled to stay open against the bright light, but he couldn't help sneaking a glance at the other.

The crown prince was still struggling. Toris had to praise him for that. He was flailing around the ground, trying to get himself standing to no avail. As Toris rummaged in his carrier bag for a strip of cloth and a canteen of water, a single question came to mind: What would he do with him?

The crown prince answered immediately.

"Hey, can you like, let me go now?" He demanded. Although his voice was muted from the strip of cloth pulled taut across his mouth Toris could still hear every intonation and intricacy. The sharp cut of his words and the whine at the end of the _go_ … and the irritation, which was the strangest of them all. How was he not scared?

Toris didn't reply. Instead, he pulled his shirt sleeve down and used the cloth to dab water onto the gash on his shoulder. It stung _badly_ – he bit back a sharp inhale, refusing to give into the fire ant-like sensation crawling up and down his bicep and the demands of the crown prince. It was supposed to quiet him, but if anything, all it did was make him demand _louder_.

"Did you not hear me or something? I told you to _let me go!_ "

Toris ached to shush the crown prince, but if he gave him any form of acknowledgement, all would be lost. It would be better to just ignore him and let him cry himself out. He continued dabbing his injury, working from the outside in, making sure to wipe away any speck of dirt. Infection was the last thing he needed. With a frown, he eyed the soiled piece of rag – what a waste! he cried out internally – and ripped it off, using the rest to roll around the gash. He raised his arm up – it wrapped around his shoulder, soaking up what was left of the blood – he tore the remaining cloth off, and then –

With a forceful movement, the crown prince rolled to the side and knocked over the canteen.

Toris yelped. He scrambled to set the canteen upright, but it was too late. A quarter of the liquid was already gone, spilled into the rich soil. Gods, what a waste! There were only four canteens left, and he had no idea when he would be able to get water again, or if he would be able to at all. His stomach growled forlornly. All the fatigue of the day burrowed into his bones as Toris turned his head to stare blankly at the crown prince, who was struggling to slip his hands out of the knots Gilbert tied earlier. His wrists were already beginning to chafe.

The crown prince was dangerous. That was for certain. Dangerous and unpredictable. Toris set the canteen in his lap and scooted backwards. Yes, he would have to keep an eye on him, and not only because he was the crown prince. Even his heat-addled mind knew that.

The throbbing in his shoulder had ceased. He would have to leave soon. Gods forbid that someone would stumble upon their trail. Toris kept his eyes on the other's face, observing each detail with quick glances. He had a small nose. Freckles on each cheek. Clear skin. That would be a trouble to hide in the cities. His features were so distinct. His face would have to be covered. And his hair… something would have to be done about that, though Toris didn't like the thought of it. He always hated messing with a victim's hair. Always.

The crown prince was breathing heavily. There was an airy quality to his voice as he spoke, forceful yet with a quiver at the end of each word. "Now I'm gonna ask again, and this time you're totally gonna go with it, okay? _Let me go_."

Stubborn _and_ gutsy. The information would be useful for later. "Are you being serious right now? You do realize that was part of your water supply too… right?"

"What?" The crown prince's body stiffened. His nose crinkled.

"You just spilled a quarter of your own water supply."

There was a tense pause at this.

"Whatever." The crown prince said airily. "I'll just steal your water instead."

Toris grimaced. He struggled not to run his hands down his face.

 _Naïve._

"It doesn't work that way."

"It does because I said it does."

"No, it doesn't. There are other people in the world besides you."

The crown prince stilled.

"Do you even know who you're speaking to right now? I'm your crown prince. You do as I say or you get your ass stuck in jail. Like you, right after I get out of here."

 _Bossy._

"There are other reasons why I wouldn't want you to drink my water." Toris exhaled slowly.

"Why?" The crown prince asked, lightning fast. He wiggled his head up and tried to move it in the direction of Toris's voice. "Do you wanna kill me?"

Toris slipped the canteen of water back into his carrier bag and let the words hang in the sticky air. Fatigue clung onto every muscle, but not once did he let his eyes close or stray away from the crown prince's face for more than a second. "No."

The crown prince hesitated.

He clenched his fists together.

"Yeah, right." He spat out bitterly. "You totally want to kill me. I'm not an idiot. You're gonna kill me, and then you're gonna like, leave me to rot in a nasty old forest somewhere."

 _No,_ Toris protested in his mind, _I don't._

In reality, he said nothing.

"But guess what?" The crown prince continued, voice rising with every syllable. "You – you aren't going to kill me. I don't _want_ you to kill me. So you're going to let me go right now, and – _get your hands off of me!_ "

Toris had had enough. He stood up and, with shaky arms, grabbed the crown prince and slung him over his shoulder. The stakes were too high for him to mess up even once. He couldn't have the crown prince talk. Not when he didn't know how far away they were from the main road. Even if they were far away, the crown prince's voice could carry with the wind. His voice could be heard. His voice could alert the royal guards that were surely looking for him now. (And if they weren't looking for him now, they would be looking for him in an hour or two.)

His voice could ruin everything.

"We're going." Toris said, taking a small step forward. The green grass beckoned to him with soft tips. They would make a nice bed for a nap, he thought… of course, it was too late for that now. There would be a time for resting in other places.

The crown prince continued to struggle. He was absolutely upset, flailing around in Toris's arms. And it was understandable. Imagine being kidnapped in the middle of the night? For a second, pity chipped at his heart.

 _No,_ his mind whispered. _Eduard. Raivis. Remember._

He shook his head and continued west. Of course.

He wouldn't have Ivan Zimavich hurt his brothers. Not in a million years.

"Let me go!" The crown prince screamed. His blond hair blew into Toris's eyes and mouth. "I have better things to do than be abducted by a creepy old stranger!"

 _We're the same age!_ Toris wanted to scream. He grit his teeth and continued on. Seventeen. He was seventeen years old. He didn't look that old, did he?

It was only fitting. He was only seventeen, yet his bones were old and heavy. Things a war veteran would experience. Not a seventeen year old boy.

Then again, not many war veterans had had to carry the crown prince over their shoulders.

" _Stop._ "

The crown prince kicked him in the torso. Toris wheezed, momentarily stopping in his tracks. He spit out a gob of white and saw stars, like grains of salt and pepper, dance in his vision.

This was going to be difficult, but he would get through it. He would get through it. It was just a few miles to the mountains. He would see Eduard and Raivis and Ivan Zimavich there, and they would lock the prince in the cellar, and they would issue the ransom note, and then the money would come. The money would come through the mail, the crown prince would go free… and who knew what would happen after that?

A cabin in the woods. Leather-bound books for Eduard. Pretty wooden deer with marble eyes for Raivis. A life distanced from Ivan Zimavich.

A flower garden for all of them, just like the one their mother used to have. Before they moved to the city. Before things went bad.

Before she got sick.

Toris shook his head. It wouldn't do to think of those things now. There was business to think of, and goals to check off and a schedule to maintain. He squared his shoulders and wrapped an arm around the crown prince's legs for support. He would get through it. He would get through it. He took a deep breath and stepped forward.

Or so he thought.

A moment later, the crown prince jerked violently and kicked Toris's stomach _hard_.

Toris's eyes watered. He inhaled sharply and fell to the ground.

The crown prince kicked again.

Bile rose up at the back of his throat.

Toris retched.

He would get through it. One way or another.

Even if it meant putting up with all the stomach kicks in the world.

* * *

 **Oh wow. This chapter came quicker than expected. Honestly, I thought that I wouldn't even be at the first sentence at this point, but the amazing reviews from last chapter inspired me to write, so here we are. I love every single one of the people who have favorited and followed and reviewed. You guys make my day. And I'll admit it - sometimes, when I'm going through a writing stump, I'll read through the reviews to motivate myself once more.**

 **So here we are at Chapter Three. It was refreshing to write this after the behemoth that was Chapter Two, if only because I got to write Feliks and Toris interacting for the first time. In my opinion the dynamic is what makes or breaks a fic, so I really hope that everyone was IC, _especially_ Poland. Getting his characterization down was a pain in the ass. Hopefully that'll iron itself out as I write him more.**

 **Finding the right balance for his speech pattern was also a pain in the ass. I want him to have the same speech pattern as the anime Poland we all know and (mostly) love, but I don't want to go overboard with it. I tried to balance it out. Hopefully it was alright. Feel free to leave a review telling me what you think. Did I get hit his characterization right on the head or was something off? Was his speech pattern okay or did that feel off, too? Heck, drop me a PM if you think the review will be too long. Any (respectful) critique is welcome.**

 **I sat myself down and plotted everything until Chapter Eight, so expect chapters Four to Eight to come out soon, too. I also have some other projects in the works, mainly two Leokumi oneshots and a few LietPol, IceLat, and DenEst things that have been floating around in my mind for a while. Maybe a DenNor multi-chapter, too? I don't know. That one needs a bit more thinking.**

 **This author's note was long. Really long. Sorry about that. Anyways, this brings an end to that. Thank you for reading the latest chapter of Knight Unexpected, and have a great day!**

 **-NC**

 **tumblr: nonbinarymage**

 **fic tag: fic: knight unexpected**


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four

 **Surprise! I'm not dead!**

 **There's of this Author's Note at the end of the chapter, so scroll down if you want to see that.**

* * *

Toris liked the idea of being a pine tree.

Perhaps it was because he grew up among them. Ivan Zimavich had many houses around the country, but he spent most of his time in the northern ones. Because they were bound to be his apprentices, the Laurinaitis brothers did, too. They didn't have much of a choice about that. But even if it was partially against his will, Toris found reasons to enjoy the low-lying mountain cabins. He enjoyed Katyusha's mushroom soup and stews, and the preserves she would make with the scraps. He enjoyed the sweaters Natalya would knit out of thick yarn, and the mittens she would make out of the excess. (In a way, the weight of the yarn reminded him of a mother's hug. He would wear them to bed at night.) Yet the most enjoyable parts about those mountain cabins were not the things that were made inside of them, but the things that roamed outside. His favorites were the wildflower garden Eduard would tend to in the house by the river, the rock Raivis would sit under by the house in the cliff… and the pine trees.

Yes, there were always the trees. They had trunks that stretched as wide as boulders, making them the biggest trees Toris had ever seen. They grew strong and true and stuck to their path. If a bolt of lightning hit one, the tree would simply grow around the hole and continue upwards. He could spent minutes looking at them. Hours. Days. He did. If he was sent out to gather vegetables, Toris would see if he could spare a moment to sit under the shadow of one of those trees. If it was a good day, he would make himself a cushion of pine needles. If it was a bad day, he would only take a moment's glance at the canopy. Either way, just being under the trees soothed his frantic heart.

Pine trees did not have to worry about where to go. Pine trees already had their lives planned out for them. As Toris crouched on the hayloft of the barn in the plains, he thought about those trees. He thought that perhaps he should have been born a pine tree instead.

For the first time in his life, he was unsure of where to go. He felt unsteady, like a boat rocking between restless waves. The plan went wrong. He was supposed to keep west and hide in the barns until Aphesia, but that was unrealistic. The western backroads would soon be flooded with royal guards and people seeking the crown prince's reward money. It was out of the question. He also sent Gilbert in a random direction, where he could die from a wild animal attack, be captured, or – even worse – give away the crown prince's location in an act of defiance. It was the right decision at the time. At that moment Toris was confident in sending Gilbert away. Proud, even. He knew his decision was right. But as the hours crept by, and as the light grew longer and darker, self-doubt began to trickle in. It started with pokes against Gilbert's character. His arrogance, his loud mouth. Of course, Ivan Zimavich trusted Gilbert not to do any of that – there was a reason why he was assigned on possibly the most important mission – but…

He sent him away. Gilbert did not have a partner to control him. There was a chance that maybe, just maybe, Toris made the wrong choice. And now that Gilbert was gone he swayed from side to side, from blood loss or confusion or both. He didn't know. He didn't know anything. He didn't know when his wound would heal. He didn't know how he would go on with the mission.

If he wanted to, he could make a new plan. He could rewrite the rulebook. Ivan Zimavich wouldn't hear of the mess for at least a day or two. By then, Toris could be out of the country. He could run away. He could leave the crown prince in the barn and start a new life with Eduard and Raivis. Or he could return the crown prince, claim the reward money, leave the country with Eduard and Raivis, and start a new life overseas. For the first time in his life, there was no one telling him what to do.

Toris wasn't sure if he liked that idea.

The floor of the hayloft was so soft that it molded itself to his fingertips. It was the rot that made the barn so perfect. No one would think to enter a mossy barn that was leaning to one side. Although it was night in the country, it was not dark. The place where the doors had once been opened like a heaving, gaping maw, letting in a flood of moonlight. Wooden boxes and stacks of hey rotted in the center of the barn. Overhead, mosquitoes and flies sung a familiar lullaby.

Toris crouched low in the corner of the hayloft. One hand rested on his sword, while the other rested on the floor. His eyes darted from corner to corner. He didn't sit down – not only because of the potential for a raid by bandits, but because his bandaged shoulder ached whenever he moved. The bleeding stopped more than a day ago, but he redid the wrappings earlier and the fresh dab of Katyusha's poultice would take a while to set in. He didn't want to take the risk.

The crown prince slept on the floor next to him, face to the wall. Toris tried to make a comfortable spot for him. He cleared the rotting hay away, and laid a thin wool blanket on the floor so the crown prince could stretch his legs out. A treacherous climb up a rotting ladder was a small price to pay for a sleeping prince. At least his ears got a chance to rest.

Now that he wasn't struggling, Toris found that the crown prince looked… normal. Despite his title and his fancy clothes, the prince had his arms wrapped around himself like any other boy. (Toris wondered why exactly he thought that the crown prince wouldn't wrap his arms around himself when he slept. In fact… how did he think the crown prince slept, anyways? Did he think he slept bundled in a cocoon of silks and velvet? That was probably the case, knowing his mind.) Sometimes his arms twitched – sometimes they shook. Violently. His whole body would shake then, and it would not stop until minutes later. (Toris made a note to ask Eduard why exactly some people shook in their sleep.) There was a crease between his eyebrows, a slight frown. Occasionally, he mumbled and buried his head into the burlap sack pillow.

Worry.

Eduard had the same crease between his eyebrows when he was worried. Raivis, too, was fond of burying his head into his pillow. The only difference was that he drooled – but maybe the crown prince did that, too, because there was a hint of moisture forming at the corner of his lip... Toris looked away quickly, averting his eyes back to the barn door, to the grass outside that glowed silver in the moonlight. It wasn't in his place to intrude on someone's worry. But – and this was another out of place thought, one that made him frown – he wondered what the crown prince could be worrying about. Besides being kidnapped. (The word made him shudder. Thinking about his job like that only made things harder, so he tried to push it to the back of his mind. The sensation lingered.)

The crown prince had a family. Family and friends and people who liked him. Did he worry about them, too?

Toris hoped he did. He certainly worried about his, among other things. The thought made him laugh, breathless and quiet amongst the rustling of wind in the rafters. Yes. Other things? That was an understatement.

There was the issue of food, for one. Food, water, shelter. Where he would take the crown prince.

Gilbert.

If only Gilbert was in the barn. Gilbert, with his wagon and the horse. They would be a quarter of the way to Ivan Zimavich's house by now. A quarter of the way to the end. Without him, Toris was hiding in a rotting barn with no clear path to go on.

The worst part was that it was his fault. _His._

There were many ways he could go.

He could take the first route. Gilbert's route. The clearest plan of action. He could steal a merchant's wagon and go through the main road. The crown prince would be kept in a box or a sack, and at night Toris would let him out so he could attend to his personal needs. But that was foolish. Amateur. The plan was eliminated before it could even be considered. Of course he wouldn't take that route. There were too many nosy merchants who would want to compare goods and too many royal guards desperate to find their prince. Besides, Toris was sure that once Sigurd and Mathias woke up, his face and Gilbert's would be spread all over the kingdom. Adding that to the crown prince's resentment made taking that road more than a risk. It was suicide. It would mean murdering everyone in Ivan Zimavich's household, too, assuming that Toris was captured. Whatever force captured him could connect him to Gilbert and the household. Then Eduard, Raivis, Katyusha, Natalya… they would all suffer. Because of him.

Bloody, bruised faces. Broken glasses. A sharp winter knife. The thought of it all rested heavy on Toris's shoulders.

He could take the second route. The backup route. A year before, when the mission was still in its planning stage, Ivan Zimavich mapped out several alternative routes should something go wrong. He was supposed to stay with Gilbert if the wagon was compromised. They were supposed to take the longest, most roundabout way through the country. It involved going south and sticking close to the western border… but not too close. They were supposed to stay far enough to avoid the border patrol, but close enough to run to over the border if worse came to worst. If it took too long and tensions were growing high, they were supposed to hide in one of the many safe houses Ivan Zimavich set up. His reasoning was that if they took such a long, roundabout way and avoided as many people as possible, the castle would believe that the prince was smuggled out of the border and focus their attentions to the neighboring countries. Then Toris and Gilbert could make their way to the mountains and, once they got there, raise the ransom price. It was taking advantage of the castle's search, which was guaranteed to become frantic after more than a month.

Toris thought it was crazy. Insane. A farce. Taking such a long time increased the risk of capture. Gilbert, with his white hair and red eyes, was easily recognizable. And staying close to the border? Terrible. A royal guard patrol could easily apprehend them. The worst thing about the plan was how Ivan Zimavich expected the crown prince to be perfectly controlled… or maybe the worst thing was how Ivan Zimabich expected Toris to perfectly control him. Did he just assume that they would be okay after being separated from family for so long? The prince would go out of his mind. Even if it was made with the best intentions, Toris found it extremely impolite. He never said anything, of course. Ivan Zimavich always kept his pipe nearby. But in his mind, he thought that perhaps there was another way of escaping. A better way that would be less time consuming.

 _This could be your way of testing it._

Toris sat up. He shook his leg, restless.

No. He couldn't take advantage of Ivan Zimavich's time and money like that. But there were so many other things he could do! He could continue west and instead of heading to Aphesia, he could head to the river that hugged the western border. Not many people visited the Smok River. The people preferred its gentler tributaries, for the main river itself was wild and unpredictable. It flooded during the summer. Water spilled from it for miles, making the forest lush and green – and extremely hard to navigate. The forest grew tall and thick and strong, with the canopy so dense that only the barest amount of sunlight hit the forest floor. No one would dare go there in flood season.

Toris could navigate through the forest into the north. He knew he could. The summer floods would not end for a few weeks. If he just avoided civilization and got to higher ground when the flood waters came, he would be able to make his way up the country into the mountains. From there, he would go east. Then would reach Ivan Zimavich's house in a matter of days. A few weeks at the most. It was better than the few months it would take if they went with Ivan Zimavich's back up plan.

No. He was being cocky. There was no way his plan would work. It would be safer to take the long way around. He had brothers. He had people he needed to provide for. It was a risk he couldn't take, especially on a mission as important as this one. If he made one misstep – if he miscalculated the length of the flood season, or if he strayed too far away from the river – he would be caught. He would be sent to jail. It would all be for nothing. Caution and reason reckoned that he should take the longer way, not just for himself, but for Eduard and Raivis and Katyusha and Natalya and even Gilbert. He should take the long way not just for himself, but for all of the people who depended on the success of this one mission.

But didn't the crown prince have the same? Didn't he deserve to go home to his family as soon as possible? Even if he was kidnapped, he still had rights. He had the queen and the king. Toris saw a painting of them once. It was in the marketplace of a little village in the south. A vendor was selling miniatures of the painting in celebration of the king and queen's tenth year of marriage. They were sitting together, facing each other. The queen had the crown prince's angular nose; the king had the crown prince's feline eyes. They were heavy fabrics, velvets and spotted furs, and their necks drooped with diamonds and pearls. Yet the brightest thing in the portrait was not the queen's pearl necklace or the king's golden crown. No, it was the looks they were sending each other. They were looking at each other with soft eyes that held so much affection that Toris blushed thinking about it.

It wouldn't be right to deny the crown prince of that, even for a few months. It wouldn't. He was terrified. Toris was, too. For even though he knew he could navigate the forest – he knew it, he knew it (or maybe he was just trying to convince himself of it) – Ivan Zimavich would raise hell once he found out, as he inevitably would. A chill went up Toris's spine as he thought about the image of Ivan Zimavich raising his pipe, eyes brimming with fury. He crouched down into the corner of the barn and instinctively clasped a hand around his sword. For a moment he was back in the kitchen again, seven years old, with angry red welts on his back.

Perhaps it was a bad decision. Perhaps he shouldn't do it. Even thinking that way was a risk. There was too much on the line. It was wrong. Something would mess up, as it did with Gilbert. Ivan Zimavich knew best. If Toris followed the premade plan, everything would go well. It would take months to see his family again, but… if it was for them, it would be worth it.

But the crown prince had that too, didn't he? He had a family. A family who loved him and cared about him. If there was one thing that Toris Laurinaitis understood it was the feeling of a hug. He understood the warmth and love a kind word can bring, the power of a brotherly bond. He felt it. He lived it.

He remembered Ivan Zimavich's house, he remembered the kitchen, and he remembered Katyusha. He remembered how she put poultice on his back and wiped his tears when he cried. He remembered how Natalya (begrudgingly) brought bitter black tea to soothe his sore throat. He remembered how she supplied the bandages. How they ran out, and how she used her old cotton bow to serve as a temporary bandage until Ivan Zimavich stopped drinking enough to give her money for new ones. Most of all he remembered how Raivis and Eduard cried like babies (they practically were), staying by Toris's bedside until he felt well enough to feed himself chicken broth. He remembered that. He remembered family.

One step.

It only took one step to change his life. Gilbert was already heading in a random direction. Half of the castle guards would be following his tracks by next morning. If Toris could get himself to the forest in time – which he knew he could – he could cover up his scent, guide them in the wrong direction. He knew he could. He had to.

Maybe it was being selfish. Maybe it was being empathetic. Either way, in that moment Toris saw his brothers and the crown prince's parents. He saw the glint of glasses and a blond curl, and he saw feline eyes and an angular nose. Gently, he grasped both images close to his heart and held them there tight.

The birds sang outside. Toris let himself relax. He sit down, and did not flinch when the hayloft creaked beneath him.

One step.

A deep breath.

 _I'll go on the second route._

It would be better for the crown prince. It would be better for him. He could get home sooner. The whole ordeal would be over with, done. Ivan Zimavich would be furious, but… At least the crown prince would be able to see his family. At least Toris would have done something right for him. He knew the plan was a long shot. It was a long shot, but it was plausible.

He just hoped he could pull it off.

* * *

 **Everyone knows about writer's block. It's vicious, it's cruel, and it prevents any creativity and inspiration from flowing to your brain. In short: it sucks.**

 **I thought I knew what writer's block was. I though I experienced it with Chapter Two. Because Chapter Two drained me. It was frustrating, it was terrible, and it provoked a lot of swearing and hair tearing. It was the only thing stopping me from completing this fic. But I continued writing, and I got through it. After that, Chapter Three was a walk in the park.**

 **But this chapter. _This chapter_.**

 **This chapter was a bitch to write.**

 **I plotted out every inch of Knight Unexpected during the summer. I knew what was going to happen when, all of the symbolism I would use, and the themes I planned on exploring. I knew everything... except what would happen during Chapter Four.**

 **Originally, this chapter was supposed to be a travel montage. It was supposed to bring Toris and Feliks to a wary comfort zone in their relationship so I could write an important scene in Chapter Five. In short: it was a transitional chapter. I didn't know that. I didn't even think of it like that until recently.**

 **I went through many, many drafts of this chapter. There are six in all, seven counting the file I used for storing the cuts I was attached to. One draft involved Toris describing the walk. Another involved Toris getting into the barn and describing it in _excruciating_ detail. There was one draft that started with a purple prose-y description of Toris and Feliks walking, and another that started with Toris meeting a character who I won't reveal because it's a spoiler. Like I said, it was a _bitch_.**

 **I almost scrapped this fic because of it. That's how bad it was.**

 **You know what, though? I'm damn proud of this chapter. I'm proud of it and how much effort I put into it, even if it made me want to tear out my hair multiple times. I'm glad I finally finished it. And I'm glad so many of you like and support this fic. 19 faves and 20 follows on a little three chapter fic! It makes me smile just thinking about it.**

 **Here's something to remember, though. Kids, next time you write a fic, _write it all before publishing_. You will thank yourself. Trust me.**

 **Anyways! I'm so sorry for how long this chapter took. I promise the next one will be up shortly. Sorry for the huge digression, but I just had to get that out of my system. ;_;; Now for the other announcements.**

 **Thank you all so much for the follows, faves, and the reviews. Just knowing that people are reading this fic fills me with inspiration! Trust me, I wouldn't be anywhere without you guys. I have a question, though: did my writing improve over the eight month hiatus? I'm curious. Tell me what you think in a review. Or, if you want, you can send me an ask on tumblr. My tumblr is nonbinarymage, so if you have any questions, concerns, or just want to yell at me about this fic, come check out my blog. The fic tag is fic: knight unexpected.**

 **Also. Remember how I said that I almost gave up on writing this fic because of this chapter? Yeah. While I was in my writing slump, I started writing the first chapter of another fic that I've had in the making for _ages_.**

 **As of November 2016, _A Light in The Attic_ is officially a WIP! It's a first person DenNor fic in Nor's PoV, and I'm pretty excited about it! I won't publish the first chapter now because I want to finish Knight Unexpected first. I also want to finish it before publishing. It'll be easier on my stress and writer's block. OTL. Instead, I'll show you guys a little sneak peak of it.**

 **"** On June 17th, Leifur's birthday, I light a candle by his portrait on the mantelpiece.

The candle is small, about the size of my thumb, and bright white. It smells faintly of vanilla and pine needles. Although it trembles when confronted with the portrait, and although it is surrounded by sprigs of bluebells on either side, it shines brightly and fiercely. The flame sputters when I adjust the bluebells; it chokes when I wipe the dust off of Leifur's portrait with a white cotton cloth. But not once does it give out. And in this way, the little white candle lights the living room."

 **So there it is.**

 **That's it for this Author's Note. Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed this (belated) chapter of Knight Unexpected. Peace out!**

 **-NC 3**


	5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

 ***cackles***

 **I'm back again. Author's Note at the end.**

 **This is where it starts to get interesting.**

* * *

Part of his new end-all be-all get-all policy, Toris decided, was to stop coddling the crown prince. There would be no more babying the teenage Feliks Łukasiewicz. He had given too much of himself already, and the privileges were stacking higher and higher by the day. First it was talking back. Then it was the water. The third would be the route taken, and the fourth… the fourth would be the mission itself. It had to be stopped. If they really were to take the longer, slower route, Toris needed to be better than better. _Professional over private,_ he thought grimly, and so it was settled. He would be more than a mission leader, more than just a couple of words flying over deaf ears. He would be an Authority.

But authority felt weird in his hands. It was like a pair of pants ten sizes too big, or a bowl that kept sliding out of his hands during wash day. He was no stranger to the art of authority – in most cases authority curled up to him like a big-boned dog, comforting in its suffocation – but there was a distinct difference between ordering a wealthy merchant to walk and ordering his crown prince to walk. The former was bearable, although uncomfortable. Most of the merchants and wealthy men walked with ease (though in reality it was more of a mix of fear and desperation). The crown prince was different.

For he had a personality, a distinct way of doing things Toris was not at all accustomed to. He had taken bossy people in the past, but this…

This was a new ring of hell even lower than betrayal. It was death itself.

The crown prince did not want to eat.

Toris wasn't naïve. He knew when breaks were needed even if he didn't want them, and if he didn't want them his body forced itself to sit. This time, he didn't need to force himself. He sat in a grassy dip in the ground, shaded by a few scraggly trees with teardrop leaves and a lonesome berry bush. The sun was high that day. It pressed onto his back like an iron, uncomfortable but steadying in its heat and presence, like humming a mother's lullaby before bed. Yes, he didn't need to force himself to sit that day. Not with the sweat rolling down his back.

But Toris paid it no mind – at least, he pretended to pay it no mind. At that moment, with the sun so high in the sky, and the shade of a tree covering his face, there was nothing he would have worried about. The crown prince was sitting to his left (but he was not screaming and his hands were wiggling and he was not making a single, miniscule movement), his sword was to his right (but his shoulder hurt whenever he picked it up and his grip grew wobblier and wobblier every day), and his burlap sacks were in his lap (but they were thinning and growing shorter and he did not know the next time they would be refilled). He was good. He was better than good. He was alive.

Yet they would have to leave. He took a far longer break than usual – ten minutes, maybe five – and the goosebumps at the back of his neck were beginning to raise. His back tensed, as if someone was watching from far away. Maybe someone was. Paranoia, that familiar friend, was paying a visit again. Toris slowly rose into a squat, careful not to catch too much attention in case someone had a pair of binoculars and good aim.

He was ready, just about to stand up, only a couple inches more. Then, just as his legs were beginning to straighten –

The bag fell out of his lap.

There was a series of soft plops, and the sound of metal hitting dry earth. Birch bark. A canteen of water.

Toris took a step back, then another one. He looked at the bags, limp and lifeless on the ground. His stomach growled.

He forgot about food.

He couldn't remember the last time he ate – a few hours ago, maybe? Eating was just not something he did during missions. It took up valuable time, and it made the hostages jealous. Sometimes the mothers looked at him, with their eyes round and soft and piteous, and the children would stare, too, with their sniffling noses and fidgeting hands… It was better that way, being hungry. He could pretend the pit in his stomach was hunger. Besides, eating would make him fatter, greedier. So he didn't eat. Not a lot, anyways. (For some reason the pit in his stomach was hungry not for food, but for something _more_. Something substantial. Something he could only distract from if he walked long and hard and pretended not to listen to the people behind him, his mission companion, and the thoughts of his own brain. Something else.

The pit in his stomach was always hungry.)

Toris picked up the bag. It felt loose and flimsy in his hands, like even a gentle breeze could blow it away. He held it tight to his chest and glanced at the crown prince. Toris wasn't incredibly hungry. He could go longer without eating. Even if he wasn't hungry, the crown prince surely was. The last time he ate a proper meal was… almost a week ago, and what they ate on the road couldn't even compare with castle food. When something hollow clenched at his heart, Toris pushed it away and cleared his throat to grab the crown prince's attention.

"There's food here."

He waited.

The crown prince said nothing. Toris took it as a moment of consideration, and decided to go rummaging through the bag himself. There wasn't much to rummage through. Just different cuts of birch bark, all the same dry, flakey texture, all creamy in color with lighter veins of brown running through them. He took a thick piece of bark and contemplated it in the dappled sun. The crown prince spoke just as Toris put the bark to his lips.

"I'm not eating anything."

He spit it out with such vehement bitterness, such _authority_ , that Toris stopped.

Something curled up in his stomach at the authoritative tone in the crown prince's voice. It was something slimy, something that curled all the way to his throat. This was different than the usual resentment. This was something else entirely, so righteous and sudden that Toris could not decide if it was hot or cold. The feeling would have choked itself out of his throat if he hadn't glued his lips shut.

Toris glanced at the blindfolded, mouth-covered crown prince bound beside him. His nose was wrinkled, turned high in the air. What did he want? Did he want to spite him? Considering how he treated the crown prince the last few days, Toris wouldn't have crossed it out of the picture. He should have ignored it. Even so… that slimy feeling, that clenching of worthlessness, burrowed itself into his stomach. A rush of emotion flooded Toris's veins – fear, anxiety, and despair all at once – and for a moment… he gave in.

"That's fine," Toris said. "You don't have to eat."

The crown prince stopped moving.

"You can starve to death if you want."

Silence.

Strong Toris had found his voice.

The crown prince stood so still he could have been dead. And maybe he was. The comment was crude, uncalled for. Toris didn't have to put it that way – he could have said it gentler, in an edible, bite-sized bit. His heart raced as he thought about what he just did: _I talked back to the crown prince. I talked back to someone. I talked back to someone for the first time in my life._

The uncontrollable, impulsive urge to get down on bended knee and beg for forgiveness right there was overwhelming.

But he was tired. He was tired of feeling lesser than. He was tired for feeling terrible for doing his job. He was tired of being tired. Discipline was in the job description, after all. He wasn't at all in the wrong. He needed to stop worrying. If the crown prince didn't want to eat, then he didn't want to eat. So Toris took a deep breath, and he stopped fidgeting with his shaking hands. He stopped staring at the shocked-still crown prince and looked forward.

"You can starve to death if you want." Toris repeated.

The crown prince made no sound.

Toris chewed a chunk of birch bark and welcomed the rawness that scratched his throat.

* * *

It was starting to grow cold.

At least, that's what Toris thought. Summer was starting to give way to fall, and the weather was first to go. He noticed it one morning when he woke up, hay stuck to his face, hair messy and clinging to woodchips after sleeping on another barnyard floor. The air, though not completely relieved of the summer's humidity, was crisp. It wasn't as dewy as usual. And, unless he was mistaken, the crown prince was shivering.

Toris could welcome the cold. He was used to it. Ivan Zimavich preferred living in the mountains during winter, something Toris never understood but never questioned. Although the cabins and stone houses were warm from the thick ash wood logs, someone had to go out and about to do errands, and Ivan Zimavich never raised his hand to volunteer during chore division… so, of course, it was usually Toris. He would set out early in the morning, bundled in a thick fur coat, and stay out doing whatever chores Katyusha gave until nightfall. Though he could not remember much of his early days in Ivan Zimavich's household, he remembered how his legs ached after trekking through snow all day – how his nose sniffled – how his lips glued shut from the cold. If he were a rich man, he would have spent all day wishing the weather away. But it wasn't as if he could actually do it – he was an orphan, a poor boy in a poor house that needed to bring in money. Over the years he grew acclimated to the cold, he grew accustomed to it, but never amiable.

So he didn't understand, then, why the crown prince was shivering like a leaf on a branch in the dead of winter. Maybe he was out of touch with reality, too accustomed to the cold to understand anyone's plight. He somehow doubted that. The days were still long and warm, and animals came out as they normally did, poking fuzzy heads out of burrows and holes in trees. If there was something wrong with the climate, the animals would have been the first to notice. They would have fled. They would have died off. The squirrels would have fallen from trees and the frogs would have drowned in their own fluid and the birds would have fallen mid air and died, singing swan songs all the way to the ground. The animals would have reacted. They didn't. To them it was just a regular summer, and to the rest of the world it was a regular summer, too.

Then again, the crown prince was not part of the regular world.

Either way, Toris tried not to pay much mind to the shivering crown prince. It was his first time so far away from the palace, after all. Culture shock was to be expected. Past merchants and wealthy men complained about the "horrible conditions" Toris kept them under, the "arduous walks" and "absolute barbarity" they were forced to endure every day. The crown prince wouldn't be any different. He had been athletic, with his fencing and his horseback riding and walks around the palace grounds, but not to the extent that Toris was. Of course he would be weakened. Sleep was often light and troubled, and there were bound to be scars from the initial abduction. Logical and concise, the explanation almost soothed Toris. It was something Eduard would say, and Eduard was generally seen as the most intelligent of Ivan Zimavich's household. If Eduard could accept a theory like that, it was bound to be good. It was bound to be reputable. It was intelligent. It was foolproof. It was logical.

Sometimes logic forgets to factor in the wild variables of human emotion. Yes, the crown prince had the same brain as other kids his age – their age, Toris realized with a hint of shock, _their age_ – but that didn't mean his personality was the same as theirs. He was a prince, someone deserving of equal respect and reverence. Someone not to be taken lightly. Someone who had thoughts and emotions and reasons of his own. Not a flat figure. A human.

Toris pondered this.

* * *

Someone was following him.

Or he was following someone.

There were wagon marks. Hard footprints in the ground. And the soft feeling that someone was watching him at all times, even when he was sleeping in a four-walled barn with a burlap sack blanket. Maybe he was paranoid. He had not screwed up on a mission _this badly_ before – not to mention that it was an important mission, with his entire future riding on his back, and no Gilbert to help carry it. There was no wagon to sleep in, no back up plan to fall back on. Being paranoid was part of the deal, right?

Toris's thoughts scrambled for purchase even when he did rationalize with himself. There was nothing wrong. It was normal. He was overthinking again, like Natalya said he did. _Idiot boy. Stupid boy._ He needed sleep. He needed to rest for more than five-ten-fifteen minutes. He needed time away.

But there was no time for time away. He could do without rest for a little while longer. And his instincts were usually never wrong. Even if there was no trouble there would be nothing wrong with keeping his guard up – right?

They were getting closer to the river. Toris noticed how more birds seemed to fly over head – river birds, not just the common sparrows and robins. There were gray warblers, the occasional group of loons – once he swore he saw a crane flying over head, crowned with red and white. With the river came civilization, and with civilization came people watching. Travelling merchants started to appear, driving in red-flagged wagons with sacks of potatoes and carrots and onions in thick, burlap sacks. And though barns were still abandoned, the wood was no longer as old as the ones before, no longer as soft. They made for better sleeping areas come nightfall. They made for better reason to be careful.

He tried to eat, even on the days when his riotous stomach betrayed him and dry heaved while walking. It didn't perturb him as much as it should – if Katyusha was there, she would have been furious, forcing him to take this and that and asking _what were you thinking, Toris you foolish boy?_ He was used to it. He didn't mind. And birch bark helped soothe the riot. It plugged the hole in his stomach, and though it was supposed to be a soft wood, he didn't mind the scorching as it went down his throat. Sometimes he welcomed it.

It brought motivation – motivation to hurry up to the river so he might actually find something decent to eat. It brought calories – not many but just enough to get through the day. It brought worry – because it was one of the only foods he brought with him.

It was a food he did not expect the crown prince to eat. Months earlier, when he was still training with Gilbert, Katyusha advised to bring more than birch bark to the mission – not only for the nutritional value, but for the crown prince, whose refined sensibilities would likely reject anything without copious amounts of salt and butter. _Don't let him starve,_ is what she said, _or we all starve with him. Poor boy._

Not only that, but the crown prince had a one track mind. His way or the highway was how it went, and he already refused to eat once. If Toris was correct, the crown prince would refuse again and starve himself to death. It was something he would not enjoy explaining to Ivan Zimavich.

It was not something he _wanted_ to explain to Ivan Zimavich.

* * *

High noon. Midday.

Toris stopped for a break.

He was feeling worse than usual that day. His injured shoulder, which he thought was healing nicely, pulsated with a white, binding pain that made him grit his teeth. His mind drifted back to it constantly, even after he redid the bandages and cleaned the wound with water and a rag – which only made it worse. No doubt it was from carrying the crown prince. Toris's back muscles ached like never before. Katyusha would find bruises and scabs and all sorts of raw skin, worse than the time he got sunburned after plowing the fields in summer. He tried to tell himself that it could have been worse. His shoulder could be infected, or it could have been severed off completely. That didn't change the fact that the pain was an annoyance and a nuisance.

He stopped after walking for a few hours, setting the crown prince and the bags down onto the ground with a shallow breath. His shoulder felt slightly better now that the crown prince was off – not by a lot, but at least he could focus on something other than the ache. He could take a five minute break to eat. Maybe ten minutes if eating took too long. Either way, he welcomed what short relief that came. Against the tall stalks of grass and the bright blue sky, Toris could almost forget what he was doing. Where he was. What he was.

He lowered himself to the ground slowly, slowly – only to gasp in pain when his shoulder moved the wrong way. Cursing internally, he set himself down with a soft _thunk_. The crown prince sat beside him, breathing heavily as he wiggled his hands back and forth, back and forth. That day's heat wasn't only taking effect on Toris. The crown prince's bed clothes, once so clean and tidy, clung to his body like a sweaty, dirty rag. His hair, greasy and uncombed, fell into his eyes. Toris observed him before wiping the sweat from his brow. Then, after another moment, he used his fingers to comb through his own hair. He was not surprised to find that it was just as greasy – if not more greasy – that the crown prince's.

There were days when the crown prince stopped complaining. The day before he would shout his hoarse raw, then he would stop suddenly, abruptly, without warning. The lack of noise would be unnerving at first, but just as Toris started to get used to it the crown prince would begin screaming again. Start, stop. Start, stop. Again and again and again. A shameful part of Toris was glad that that day was one of the quiet days. As much as he hated to admit it, he was tired. He was exhausted. His body ached and he hardly felt like he could move, much less discipline a rowdy crown prince. That was the difficult part, discipline. Though he promised himself that he would be strong and stop babying the crown prince, he couldn't help the trickle of sympathy that went through his heart whenever a problem came up. Like trying to get the crown prince to move or covering his mouth every time a caravan came by or trying to lift him without getting a kick to the back (they weren't as strong as they had been, the kicks in the back, but they were still distributed with the same force). Or trying to fasten his ties without being pushed over or scratched. Or trying to get him to eat.

Toris grabbed the nearest bag and pulled it towards him. The contents inside made him sigh with its worn familiarity. Birch bark. As always. He took out a piece of bark and studied it for a moment, feeling the way it softened beneath his fingers. If he wanted to – and there was a part of him that did, just for the satisfaction of it – he could roll the bark into a ball. He could throw it into the distance, far, far away from him and his life. A blessing for the bark.

Instead, he braced himself and put it into his mouth. The minty flavor brought a lump to his throat, or maybe that was just the stringy remains. Toris chewed. He sucked at the bark until all the flavor was gone, and then some. Even after he spit out the strings and leftover bark he continued to sit, staring into the sky as bright as cornflower blue, the clouds like slow-moving cows. He pretended that the pit in his stomach was filled by birch bark, good and nutritious, and that the vile in his throat was the mint flavor, and that the pit in his stomach wasn't something other than hunger.

He held a piece of birch bark in his hand (gently, gently) and turned to face the crown prince.

"There's food." He paused to draw the crown prince in. "Birch bark."

The crown prince stopped moving. His hands stilled. Toris took this as a sign of something to come. Something not good and very, very inconvenient and very, very tiring. He slipped his other hand onto the hilt of his sword, just as a precaution. His back straightened. He forced his mouth into a thin line.

He was hungry again.

His stomach itched and his throat itched and his hands itched, and then…

"Give me some."

Toris blinked.

The crown prince jerked his head towards Toris's general direction, brusque and certain.

"Give me some."

Toris froze.

He hesitated for a second, two, before sliding over to the crown prince with birch bark in hand. The crown prince would deny him any second now. He would kick him away and untie his hands, and somehow run away with the sword. Toris was sure of it.

It didn't happen. The crown prince simply sat there, waiting.

It would happen any minute. Any second. And suddenly, Toris found that he was watching himself, as if from another point of view. He watched himself as he slipped the crown prince's mouth covering down, bracing his hands in preparation for a sudden bite or something. No response. He watched himself as he pressed the bark to the crown prince's chapped, chapped lips, no longer the pink of a peach but the pink of the dead, the pink of people whose blood was gushing from their body. No response. He watched himself as he slipped the cloth back onto the crown prince's mouth. No response. And finally he watched the crown prince chew and chew and chew for a long, long time before swallowing the bark with a more than audible, flashy gulp.

Nothing.

It had to be a trick.

It was too quick, too easy, though Toris tried his best not to voice this. _Why are you doing this?_ He wanted to ask. _What's your game?_ His hands betrayed his inner thoughts. They trembled with the adrenaline, the nervousness, the pulsating inner fear of it all. He knew the quiet was asking for too much. He knew the quiet was _too much_. There had to be some trick, some ace hidden up the crown prince's sleeve, some hidden figure in the distance, large and lurking and carrying a pipe to bear down on Toris's head at any instance –

"Hey. You."

The crown prince. His voice was hoarse and raspy, as if he hadn't used it for a long, long time, as if they were not sitting right in front of each other.

"Give me some more of… whatever that is."

 _What…?_

Toris looked at the crown prince. He drew himself back to reality.

They were staring directly at each other. He had never had a good view of the crown prince beforehand. Now he could see how small his face was, how delicate it was. The crown prince's head was held high, chin up. His voice was forceful, almost more than forceful than before. And there was a small, almost indistinguishable tremor going through his body, as if it was talking all he could to stop it from overtaking his thin frame. Or maybe… he was trying with all he could to keep it going.

It had to be a trick. Toris wasn't that stupid, and neither was the crown prince.

Still, he obliged. Toris slipped the covering down and placed a strip of birch bark into the crown prince's mouth, just as cautious – if not more cautious – than before. And again. And again. And again. All the while the crown prince was trembling like the entire world was inside him. All the while Toris's fingers were trembling with fear, with the image of a man carrying a pipe behind him, with the image of his callused fingers brushing against pale, sunburnt skin. All the while the birch bark bag was growing thinner and thinner, until the crown prince had eaten more than Toris had in a week.

Toris fed the crown prince until he could not speak.

Just before he left, with the solemnity of the moment burrowing into his bones, Toris wondered what he had done. What he failed to do. What exactly he'd gotten himself into.

* * *

There must have been something wrong with the birch bark. For the more the crown prince ate, the paler he got.

The crown prince looked normal from far away. He was still trembling like a leaf caught in winter wind. His hair, although greasy, was still the same shade of golden blond. Although the nail polish on his toe nails had chipped it was still the same glossy, shiny red, red as red as blood, red as red as the day Toris snuck into the castle, red as the day they met. It was in closer inspection that the problems laid themselves bare.

The crown prince was beginning to grow pale. His complexion was turning sallow, like a sick man on his death bed – and it certainly wasn't from the sun. Everything about him was turning sick. When Toris lifted him up, he noticed that he wasn't as heavy as usual. He coughed when he was sitting. Sometimes he dry-heaved when carried, though he tried to hold them in by biting the cloth. His voice, once so loud, carried the same conviction. But it was fading, like a music box that's been winded one too many times. The crown prince himself was fading. He was withering.

Yet he still carried the same authoritative pride. His slumping shoulders forced themselves to stand up at full attention. He jutted his chin out, not too far out as to seem arrogant but just enough to remain a leader (or maybe he was too tired to jut his chin out all the way). There was a certain confidence to him, pride that could not be extinguished, the belief that even though he was frail he was still a crown prince, dammit. Dignity.

Toris carried this fading crown prince with a chill that swept down his spine, an unsettled feeling that bled into the happiest of dreams.

It couldn't be starvation. The crown prince was eating more than Toris himself. Day after day Toris slipped the crown prince's mouth covering down and fed him birch bark, not enough to exhaust their supplies but just enough for nourishment. He ate and he ate and he ate and he never, ever stopped, even after the day's walk had completely exhausted them, even when the sun was at its highest and hottest point. There were times when it was hard to remember the birch bark. The crown prince ate fast, like a greedy cat, and as soon as he swallowed he would ask for another strip again. (Once Toris let a half smile slip past his lips, though he quickly straightened it once he realized who he was smiling at.) It was strange, seeing how fast the crown prince ate when Toris once thought himself to be a fast eater. Then again… the crown prince came from a different family. A different world. He wasn't used to eating food off the land. There were bound to be some weight loss problems.

But weight loss didn't explain it. Toris changed diets every time he left Ivan Zimavich's house for a mission, and his transitions weren't nearly as bad as the crown prince's. The crown prince shouldn't be losing that much weight. He shouldn't be pale. He shouldn't be losing strands of golden blond hair, strands of hair that Toris had to bury himself, lest someone track them down. Toris wondered if the crown prince was allergic to birch bark – but that didn't explain it either. If he was allergic, he would have come up with rashes and hives and the other symptoms in Eduard's books of medicine. Or maybe he was feeding the crown prince too much. Maybe his body couldn't handle the nourishment. Yet that didn't make sense, either. Didn't they eat rich in the castle, with chickens and stuffed hams and spices galore? Yes, that didn't make sense at all.

Nothing he could think of made sense. As Toris pulled a burlap over himself and tried to sleep, he found that he was plagued with thoughts of empathy, thoughts of sympathy. Thoughts that he should not have had.

 _What if he died?_

He thought about his brothers. Eduard and Raivis, and how they would be affected. How they would tremble and shake when Ivan Zimavich would enter their room. How they would scream. How they would cry. He thought about how they were the only family he had left.

Toris knew Ivan Zimavich. He knew that if he failed, the man wouldn't just ostracize him. He would lay the blame on him. He would turn him into the castle without any mercy, and he would deny any and all relations to Toris Laurinaitis. And if the castle refused to believe him – if they pushed further or asked Katyusha and Natalya and Gilbert and everyone else related to the business – he would bribe them. It would be underground. There would be no meeting in the throne room, just a transaction in some back alley bar with peeling wallpaper between a castle treasurer, two senior guards, and Zimavich himself. It would be paper. The money would be tied in neat, clean stacks, with simple, hardy rope. There would be burlap sacks, fresh white gloves that Natalya starched the day before. Ivan Zimavich would take a small chunk of his riches and pass it off to the castle, who would quietly wipe away all allegations and then use their small fortune to buy more dresses for the ladies, horses for the men, toys for the children because nothing, nothing, could ever allude the grasp of money and nothing, nothing, could allude the grasp of Ivan Zimavich. He knew the man. He knew the man better than he knew himself.

Toris had everything to lose. Ivan Zimavich had nothing.

And the crown prince…

…

Thinking it was a betrayal.

The crown prince was a person Toris had kidnapped and nothing more. When they were travelling they were nothing more than acquaintance and acquaintance, employer and client. Toris moved him. Ivan Zimavich thanked him. The crown prince hated him. Yet…

He could not help thinking about the crown prince's humanity. His jutted out chin, his chapped, chapped lips. His greasy golden blond hair. His chipped nail polish.

His shaking, shaking shoulders.

It was a betrayal on the highest level. Because empathy was sympathy, and sympathy led to weakness, and weakness led to messing up and messing up led to death, social and political and all kinds imaginable, for the entire business. Messing up led to Katyusha and Natalya in jail, and Gilbert executed, and Eduard and Raivis forced out of the country, and Toris…

Toris would be dead before the castle guard even thought of Ivan Zimavich's cabins.

He was betraying himself.

But no one – no one, he thought fiercely – should have to wither away so cruelly, without a proper funeral and proper dignity. No one should have to wither away sick and pale and withdrawn and so far from home, away from the arms of family and in the company of strangers. No one should have to die a beggar's death. Not even the crown prince, and _especially_ the crown prince, despite how Gilbert complained about him, and groaned about him, and said that he had an "arrogant, prissy air about him".

He thought of himself. He thought of the crown prince. He thought of what could be going wrong. He thought about the danger of thinking, and he thought about the danger of thinking about the danger of thinking, and then he thought about what Ivan Zimavich would think if he knew he was thinking, and –

Toris sighed. As he pulled a burlap sack over himself to sleep, he sighed. That was it. That was too much for the pale, moonless night. He would try to stop thinking, to clear his mind and make way for happy, pleasant dreams, his only solstice in a world too full of reality.

He thought thinking was eating him whole.

* * *

He was sitting in a grassy ditch where birds chirped.

It was a warm, warm day, one Toris thoroughly enjoyed. The sun was settling down to sleep and with it came the familiar, honey-warm richness of a passing day. The grass yawned its wind-whistle song and stretched high, high into the sky, where it met the orange marmalade shade of summer. He would miss this season. Not only because of the bird song floating in the distance, but because of the calm. The content. It'd be such a shame, he thought, to let it flow through his hands.

He would have to, though. Because the crown prince was breathing hard again, like he couldn't get enough sweet, sweet summer air into his lungs. He sat next to Toris, half of his face covered in shadow. Then again, it didn't really matter. Because his face was hung low and solemn, and if Toris wasn't looking very closely he might have thought the crown prince was praying. But he was looking closely. And he saw the scrunched up flesh of his nose, the lines in his forehead. The paleness of the crown prince's skin, where his faint freckles popped out like mud on a window.

Toris stood up. Normally he would allow for a five minute break after meals, just to adjust himself and rest his eyes, but he decided against it that day. He was itchy to get to the river. When he was by the river, he would be able to let himself relax, just a little bit. He wouldn't have to worry about going this way or that every five minutes, or ducking himself low against the ground whenever he heard an approaching wagon (which were increasing in frequency, he noticed, and that just added to the already heavy burden on his shoulders). Most of all, he wouldn't have to worry about the crown prince as much. The cooler river climate and access to fresh water might help him. Toris knew medicine. He knew how to pick herbs and grind them into a poultice, and how use river water to make healing teas. He thanked the gods that he did. For once he could be good at something other than fighting.

He approached the crown prince.

"It's time. We're moving again."

Even when he was weakened the crown prince always found a way to struggle – whether it came in the form of kicking or punching or both. He would scream loudly, so loud that the birds went mute, and Toris would have to cup a hand over his mouth to stop the sound from spreading. Toris bent down to grab the crown prince by his shoulders. He braced himself, fully prepared for the noise and the birds flying out of their hiding spots, and the threat of curious farmers or wayward merchants with swords in their hands.

The fight came. The crown prince kicked and punched against Toris. Toris struggled to stand up again, his legs bearing the brunt of the crown prince's assault. The birds chirped in the distance, some flying away from the ruckus, some coming closer to investigate. As Toris took notice of one of the birds – a brown robin with its familiar red chest – he took note of something that he hadn't realized. Something that made him grab the crown prince by his shoulders and force him to stay still, even while the prince was still moving his bound legs and arms in slow, water-like motion.

He could hear the birds. _He could hear the birds._

The crown prince was not speaking.

He had not said a single word during that time. While they were fighting he had not made a single groan, a single noise of complaint, a single shrill, high pitched scream across the plains. Nothing. Not at all. It was so uncharacteristic, so uncanny, that it sent warning signals up and down Toris's body. Toris looked at him. He brought the crown prince so close and held his shoulders down so tightly that his arms began to shake, and then the crown prince was shaking, too, and they were both shaking, but even then he was not. Saying. A single. Word.

"Are you okay?" Toris asked.

The crown prince breathed heavily. He shook his head in a furious, hair-bobbing _no_ , then tried to shrug Toris's hands off with a weak strength that only made Toris's hands plant him down firmer.

He was onto something. He knew it. He just needed to find what. It wasn't his eyes. The crown prince was facing Toris and not some far off direction. By extension it wasn't his ears, either, because he could hear Toris speak. He could stand up properly, though his legs were wobbly. His arms were still bound and moving in front of him. There were no obvious injuries on his body. The skin on his face was pale and blemished, but free of any deep cuts. His face –

His face.

That was it.

"I'm going to do something," Toris said, then lifted one hand to find the crown prince's mouth.

The crown prince slammed into him shoulder first, making Toris stumble back and knocking himself onto the ground. Toris fell down knees first onto the grass, fists crumbling into dirt for support. The crown prince lay a few inches away from him, face down. Toris scrambled over to him and flipped him over by the shoulder. His mouth covering was loosened, and if he just – managed – to pull it off –

But the crown prince was struggling, flailing like he had never done before, using arms and legs and all other bodily appendages to wiggle his way out of Toris's grasp. Dirt was flying everywhere – Toris gagged when some landed into his mouth – but all the while the crown prince would not speak, would not scream, would not say anything other than a muffled expletive. Every time Toris's hand would get near his mouth he would shove it away with his head. The weakness of the previous days was gone, replaced with a fighting spirit unable to be quenched.

There was a grunt, a noise of protest, though Toris could not detect whose it was. He was lost in the fight, in the adrenaline of the moment, in the heart-racing feeling that he had when something was going terribly, terribly wrong. The world blurred around him and in that moment it was only him and the crown prince, the crown prince and him. Toris managed to scramble on top of the crown prince, so that he was sitting directly on top of him. It was an unfortunate position – the crown prince's bound arms jammed themselves into Toris's thighs, nearly collapsing Toris to the ground with pain. But he had the high ground. With one arm he managed to pin the crown prince's arms down, and with the other he ripped off the mouth cloth, preparing to find some horrible wound etched upon his lips and -

…

Nothing.

There was no wound. No brutality.

Nothing.

There were no blemishes, no marks on the crown prince's chapped, chapped lips. Toris sat in shocked silence for a moment.

Nothing.

There could have been nothing wrong with him. There was nothing wrong with him.

Perhaps there was nothing wrong with him at all. Perhaps it was just the chill of oncoming autumn. As Toris sat upright, hands going to restrain the crown prince's arms, he tried to rationalize what had just happened, the meaning of the revelation. If there wasn't anything wrong with the crown prince's mouth, what had happened? Not only that… what had he done to the crown prince? He had forced him to the ground, engaged in an pointless fight. Not only was it unnecessary, it had hurt. Toris's sides ached, and the crown prince's back must have ached, too, judging by the purse of his mouth and the sweat rolling down his temple.

Then, as if things could not get any worse –

The crown prince retched.

He spit on Toris.

It was unchewed birch bark.

It stuck to Toris's shirt, soggy and crumpled, a light brown blob of hatred. Toris stared at it. He looked at the blob, then at the crown prince, with his gasping mouth and heavy breathing. What was he doing – was he sick? Was he not hungry? As he started cleaning the mess off, he wondered if it was something in the birch bark, if he was giving the crown prince too much. Perhaps he was allergic to it. Perhaps he was sick of it. Perhaps Toris should give him another food. Perhaps…

The realization struck in a thunderous moment later, a lightning bolt hitting wood.

The crown prince was not sick of birch bark. He was not sick of eating. He had sucked on the birch bark once or twice but not fully, as the tough, stringy strands were still attached to the soft flesh of the bark. Oh, no. It explained why he was eating so much. Why he ate so fast. Why he didn't scream the time before the fight. Why the crown prince held his head down after every meal, as if in prayer. It explained why he was pale, why his hair was falling out. Why he jutted out his chin with such pride. Why his shoulders shook. It explained why he was so frail. Why he was losing so much weight. Why he held his shoulders high.

Toris drew in a sharp breath. His world started shifting, redefining itself in colors he didn't even knew existed.

The crown prince's mouth lifted into a weak, knife-cut smirk.

It was so obvious. If Toris had paid more attention, it would have been obvious since the very beginning.

The crown prince was starving himself to death.

* * *

 **Hello, lovely readers! It is I, NC, back again after four months without updating. We've finally reached Chapter Five! Honestly, I never thought I would get here, but here we are.**

 **Stuff is gonna go _down_ after this chapter. It's gonna be intense. This is the part where things start to get interesting, where we finally see more LietPol interaction. This is one of the chapters I've been waiting to write for a while, and so is the next chapter, and the chapter after that one... so expect a lot of short updates from here on out.**

 **I started to read Romeo and Juliet a couple weeks ago, and if I'm to be honest, it's probably what gave me writing motivation... OTL. Pretty nerdy, but hey, it worked. (Don't be surprised if you see me writing some Bencutio fanfiction, btw. There's so much potential for them!)**

 **Anyways. I don't have much to say in this Author's Note. I tried to write my DenNor fic, A Light in the Attic, but it felt like I was cheating on Knight Unexpected while writing it... yeah, I can't write two fics at once. It's hard to devote my energy to more than one project. Expect to see that after I finish Knight Unexpected.**

 **I do have an angsty PruHun one shot in the works, though. It'll maybe be up between Chapter Five and Chapter Six of this fic. I don't know for sure, but yeah.** **¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ We'll see.**

 **That's all I have to say. Goodbye, lovely readers! I hope you enjoyed the latest update and, as always, have a wonderful day and thank you for reading! Critique and reviews in general are always welcome (but only if you want to)!**

 **Peace out!**

 **-NC**

 **tumblr: nonbinarymage (feel free to drop an ask about this fic or any other writing endeavors any time!)**

 **fic tag: fic: knight unexpected**


	6. Chapter Six

Chapter Six

 **A quick update? What is this, the end of the world?**

 **Author's Note at the end.**

* * *

 **9-3-17**

 **Author's Note**

 **Since I can't publish non-story chapters (thank you for notifying me of that, kind Guest), I've attached Knight Unexpected's final Author's Note to its final chapter.**

 **Hi. I'm back with some lukewarm news. Don't get too excited, but don't get too depressed, either. Scroll down to the very end for an Author's Note.**

 **Also, if you're worried about the fate of the story: read until the end. It gets better, I promise.**

 **TL;DR: There are no goodbyes, only see you laters.**

* * *

The crown prince's thinness. His paleness. His incomparable waste of food. That slow, knife-cut smile, like he was sharing a secret only he could understand.

Toris buried his head in his hands.

It all made sense.

* * *

He was a failure.

He could have done something about it if he had known earlier. If he had paid attention earlier. If he forced himself out of his anxiety and stopped caring earlier. Because wasn't it his empathy that broke him down? Wasn't it his sympathy that fed the crown prince with piece after piece of birch bark? Wasn't it his emotions that dug him into this mess? If he separated the personal from the professional everything would be fine – he wouldn't be tired, the crown prince wouldn't be starving, they wouldn't be running out of food. They would be going as usual, running on a well-thought script written on worn yellow pages. It was Toris's fault. Everything was _his fault_. It was a stupid, stupid decision, one of the worst he had made in a long time. One he had no freedom to make. People were depending on him – too many to name – and the whole thing just _ached_ , like a broken wound.

He should have known better.

But his mind was muddled, confused, stuck in the mud with nothing to grab onto. As much as he tried to will it away, to curse it and shove it into some faraway corner of his mind, Toris could not help but think about the crown prince. He could not help but think about his condition, his twitchy fingers and growling stomach. And when he thought about the crown prince he thought of the royal family – the king with his feline eyes, the queen with her angular nose. He thought of the crown prince's bedroom, with its wide bed and red velvet curtains, dark as blood in the night. He thought of the crown prince's nail polish, and his soiled nightclothes, and…

His shoulders, holding themselves with a pride so bright it hurt.

For once, Toris wasn't just thinking about the mission. He wasn't just thinking about Ivan Zimavich. Or the money. Or both of his brothers. For once, he wasn't even thinking about himself.

For once, he was thinking about the person.

Toris was still in shock the morning after the discovery.

The night before felt like a fever dream, like something fell slightly out of place in his memory. He didn't believe it could have happened – and part of him refused to believe it, too, because to be fooled by the crown prince meant that he was wrong, and to be wrong was to be dead in Ivan Zimavich's household. That morning was crowned with dew, little buds of water sprinkled on every blade of grass and spider's web. The sky was gray, covered by the thick fabrics of cumulus clouds. It was a good day for travelling. The bad weather meant less people would be around, and less people meant less exposure… part of him should have been rejoicing, and that part of him was. There was only one thing wrong – a small ache in his chest, one that threw everything off. It wasn't as much physical as it was mental. His mind kept on going back to the ache, and as it went back to the ache he kept on wondering what caused it in the first place.

But he didn't have time to dwell on aches in his chest, much less their cause and meaning. In fact, he didn't think he wanted to know. People would be awake soon. They would be tending to their farms and to themselves, and then they would go wherever people went in the morning – which would put them in direct contact with the crown prince if Toris was particularly unlucky. He allowed himself a moment to dwell on this, letting a suitable amount of fear into his veins to get the blood pumping, before pushing off the ground and folding his burlap sack blanket in two. Toris moved from bag to bag, checking and rechecking their ties then slinging them onto himself. He half-heartedly swiped a soft cloth over his sword, and frowned when it came away covered in dirt. He hated to leave his sword so dirty – something about it was so instinctually wrong, and if he accidentally stabbed himself he risked infection – but it would have to be done later, when he had more time, because all he could focus on at that moment (all he _wanted_ to focus on at that moment) was the long stretch of field ahead and the gradual lightening of the clouds.

"Bags, bags…" he murmured. He picked them up in order of miscellaneous supplies, water, and food, a system that took months to perfect. He planned out where each bag would go – practically memorized it, in fact – that he no longer had to look at each bag, just grabbed and went. He was surveying his surroundings once more (after all, it never hurt to be cautious) when he heard a soft crunch from the food bag. He blinked and coaxed it open. Birch bark. He would have ignored the growling of his stomach and just ate on the walk, but something about the morning made Toris carefully pick two strips and place them on the tip of his tongue. _Mm_. The minty flavor brightened his tongue. (He remembered what Katyusha said about mint, that it usually quelled anxiety and stomach problems, and put another two strips into his mouth.) He chewed slowly as he went about dirtying the campsite, rustling grass and making it believably natural. A turned stone here was flipped over, and an imprint on a patch of dirt was stomped out. A bug was placed over there. Strands of hair – both the crown prince's and his own – were picked up and stuffed into one of the miscellaneous sacks for later discarding. Toris spit out only what he had to of the birch bark, and when he did he scattered the remaining strings so thin that they were virtually undistinguishable from the landscape. The rest of the remains he forced himself to swallow down.

After a few minutes of work, Toris surveyed the campsite with bags tied around his waist. The cover up was decent – in fact, he was almost proud of himself – but there were areas his eyes were drawn to again and again. There were the places where he scattered the birch bark, and the indent in the grass where he wrestled the crown prince, and the pieces of grass he dug up while walking around… even after fluffing the grass and flattening the birch bark lines, the area still stuck out like a sore thumb to him. Still, he would have to get moving. He had already taken too much time cleaning the campsite, and time wouldn't wait for him a second longer. Besides, he needed to make progress. If he covered enough ground that day, he estimated that they would reach the river in… a week or so. Decent progress, but it couldn't come soon enough. He was standing in front of the crown prince, just about to pick him up, when…

His left hand. It fisted around something and was very much occupied.

The birch bark.

He didn't realize he was carrying it. Somehow, it must have slipped through his mind. A frown tugged at the corner of his lips. He didn't know how he could have been so careless. To have him forget to put away one of the bags of _birch bark_ … annoyance led way to frustration, and frustration gave way to exasperation. He tucked the birch bark under his arm and proceeded to loosen one of the bigger food sacks. It was unlikely to fall out of that sack. He'd adjust it later, when he'd be forced to rest at noon.

A movement caught his attention. It came from his peripheral vision, abrupt and jolted, bringing Toris to a familiar _baBUMP-baBUMP_ before calming itself down. The crown prince was sitting up, posture impeccable except for a slump in his back. He was awake – Toris could tell by the twitching of his hands, and the slight bouncing of his legs – and, if Toris was not mistaken, he was staring right at him.

Even while blindfolded the crown prince's stare felt like it was burning through more than fabric. Toris tore his eyes away from the crown prince and instead focused on the damp birch bark sack, which currently rested on the top of the main food sack, limp and hunched over. If the crown prince was hungry, well, Toris wasn't sure how he'd manage to feed him without being upset. Resentment poked at his heart. The crown prince, after all, wasted a large chunk of his food supply. Toris was supposed to be angry – and he was, deep down. What kind of person wasted food like that? What kind of person _smiled_ after wasting food like that? The same part of him wanted nothing to do with the crown prince. If the crown prince had eaten through a few more bags, he would have sabotaged the entire mission. He would have put Toris's life in danger… and for what?

Toris toyed with the strings of the bigger food sack. If the crown prince was truly hungry, well, that would be a shame. After the events of the day before, Toris wouldn't even consider giving the crown prince more than his fair share – something he should have been doing from the beginning. He shouldn't have to go through hoops and ladders to feed the crown prince. He never treated any of the others like that. The crown prince would be lucky if he even got food today. After all, didn't he deserve punishment for what he'd done?

Yet…

Toris looked back at the prince. His head was bowed, and hair fell in front of his eyes. Although he didn't seem hungry, he could have been hiding it… and Toris remembered that kind of hunger, the ache that went through both stomach and bone. The crown prince coughed. Toris drew his eyes away, slower this time.

No.

No, he did not want to talk to the crown prince. He used his free hand to jab the smaller sack into place amongst the others. Even though they had barely spoken, had not even had a full conversation, there was a part of Toris that felt betrayed – not only by the crown prince, but also himself. That part of him didn't even want to consider offering food. What kind of person was he, forgetting the rules and acting like a parent? What kind of person did that when the world was riding on his shoulders? Maybe Natalya was right. Maybe he should be more selfish.

Then again…

The crown prince had his reasons. And it wasn't as if Toris could let him starved. If he starved, they all starved. If he died… they all died.

Toris paused. He rubbed the strings between his fingers. He remembered the hunger.

One moment later he crouched in front of the crown prince, four strips of birch bark in hand.

He waited for acknowledgement. Something, anything. A bitter "what" would have worked just fine. Even a curse would have suited. It didn't matter, as long as something came out. Of course, that was being optimistic. He got nothing from the crown prince, not even an upwards glance. Disappointment bubbled in his heart, but he quickly and quietly plugged it away. That was to be expected, anyways. Even if the crown prince did curse, it wouldn't have stopped Toris from what he was about to do. It was being done hesitantly, with more than a fair share of wariness, but it was still being done.

"Ah… There's food. If you want some." The words felt like pebbles in his mouth, hard to hold and hard to let drop. He did not like the way they clacked against each other, too stiff for their true clay meaning.

The crown prince lifted his head up, just a fraction. He sniffed. Toris saw lines forming on his forehead, eyebrows knitting together under his blindfold. His head bobbed, and for a moment, Toris thought that he was accepting the birch bark. Then he said something, low and clear and tipped with ice.

"I'd rather starve."

He raised his head, high and full, and looked at Toris.

The crown prince bowed his head after that, and did not speak a single word. He didn't acknowledge the birch bark, nor did he acknowledge Toris. At least, not directly. For there was something Toris knew he had heard for certain, something he would swear by in court even if a knife was held to his throat: the sound of a stomach growling, faint and easy to be drowned out underneath the whistle of the wind.

Toris nodded, faintly. He tried, at least, and he'd try again later, when noon came and they were both thoroughly exhausted. He took a step back and forced his dry throat to find water, birch bark, a voice, something it could cling onto. If he looked and looked he could see the long way ahead – the grass, dull brown in the morning light. The clouds, dark and low. The sky, gray as ash and twice as suffocating.

The sky that spread further than he could ever see.

* * *

Slowly, the crown prince's condition grew worse.

The crown prince refused to eat after the discovery. He never directly refused. Instead, he stopped talking. Not only because he could, but because he couldn't – his mouth dried up like sawdust. The crown prince stopped taking water, too, even if it was cold and fresh and not from one of the stale canteens. He chilled the world with his silence, his bitter indifference, his quiet calamity. In that way, the crown prince of Liathea froze over. And his ice began to shatter.

There were times when the crown prince's stomach hurt so much that whimpers slipped through his lips. He would never admit to it, and Toris would never acknowledge it. If the crown prince was asked about why he was whimpering, Toris suspected that he would deflect the question by saying that Toris's presence made him want to vomit, or that the bumpiness of the road irritated his stomach. Toris would accept the answer, of course. He'd ignore the shuffling in the night, and the sweating in the morning, and the gulping whenever Toris chewed a piece of birch bark too loud at breakfast. Toris would ignore it, and the crown prince's silence would be answer enough. They wouldn't need to say anything else. Deep down, they both knew the answer. For the crown prince shivered and shivered like no tomorrow, and when he thought Toris was unaware, he would silently clasp his hands together and dig them into Toris's skin like it was hole he needed to tunnel, a mountain he needed to climb. Something he needed to get away from.

He shivered more than ever before. Even when it was the middle of the day, even when Toris could feel their skin pressing together, even when he was asleep with two blankets over his body. It was a quiet catastrophe, a simultaneous break and unbreak. Like he was trying to keep himself together, or break himself apart. And, unknowingly, Toris shivered with him. Toris would walk and walk and walk, taking step and step after step, only to stop and find himself shaking head to toe. Not because of the crown prince, but because of what he created. What they both created.

Because Toris was just as responsible for the crown prince's hunger strike as the crown prince was. He was the one who went through with the kidnapping, after all. And though he told himself that it wasn't his fault – though he rationalized and argued and sat down to think – he could not help but take most of the blame. If he hadn't gone through with it, the crown prince would be sitting in the castle, enjoying a fine dinner, with chicken and quail and all sorts of meat Toris could only dream of. If he hadn't gone through with it, the crown prince would be sleeping in his goose-feather bed with his silk dressing gown. If he hadn't gone through with it, the crown prince would be riding his horse and practicing fencing. If he hadn't gone through with it…

If he hadn't gone through with it, the crown prince would have been surrounded by family. He would have been surrounded by his mother the queen, with her angular nose, and his father the king, with his inquisitive cat eyes. He would have been surrounded by friends. People who knew him. People who cared about him. People who loved him.

Family.

The one thing Toris and the crown prince had in common. A heart, a core, a center to keep them balanced.

Family.

He wondered what the crown prince's family was like.

Gilbert and him mapped out the royal family's schedule to a T. Toris knew that they woke up at 5 am sharp. He knew that the queen went down for her daily coffee at 5:30, followed by the king at 6 and the crown prince sometime after 7. He knew that breakfast started at 7, and that lunch started at 2, and that in between those times the king was most likely to be found in his private study, the queen in her public parlor, and the crown prince in his bedroom balcony. At 7 they would eat dinner, and after they would retreat and go to bed at 8:30. Their schedule was strict and never changing, and through all of that, the royal family only tended to come together for meals. They left each other alone for the most part, and did not talk much. Their conversation was sparse and fleeting.

Toris wondered what the royal family talked about when they did talk. Did they talk about their lives? Lovers? Futures? If he knew what they talked about, he'd know the crown prince better. And if he knew the crown prince better, maybe he'd know what to do with him. He'd know how to relax a tense situation and when to push him, and when to avoid kicks to the groin. On the physical level maybe he'd know what salves to give, and what poultices to put on, and how to get the crown prince to eat – because the crown prince could hardly hold his head up and collapsed when he walked and let hot, angry tears escape the confines of his drooping eyelids, something that made Toris look away and wish that his eyebrows were drooping. The crown prince would still kick and scratch, but the kicks rarely made contact with Toris's knees. And his scratches felt more like the slow, numbing march of messenger flies on the body of a corpse. If he could get the crown prince to eat… maybe he'd feel better about himself. Maybe they'd both feel better about themselves.

Toris could try to make poultices. He could put them on the crown prince's back and pack them on with a white bandage. He didn't spend years training for nothing. But he would always, always, be inferior to the king and queen. Because nothing – nothing – would be more helpful than the knowledge of the familiar. The home. The family.

It was something Toris wished he could have.

* * *

Toris knew a woman once.

She was tall and lanky, almost all muscle and lean meat after years of farming in the plains. She had a proud, sloping nose. A berry-bush spattering of freckles across her cheeks. Long brown hair ending at her waist, coarse and wavy, that she covered with a white bandana and braided into a single, thick rope, swinging at her left shoulder. Her hands were hard. And her expression was serious. She rarely laughed. But when she did smile – when she did laugh – her mouth blossomed like ten thousand wildflowers in summer. Her expression, normally so serious, lit the hard lines of her face in glee. Her eyes melted, warmer than any prairie honey. When her eyes melted, Toris was reminded of home.

Her friends knew her as Aušra. Her colleagues knew her as Laurinaitis. Toris knew her as mother.

Yes, Toris had a mother once. He had a mother of beauty, a mother of all love in the world. She'd take him and Eduard and Raivis out berry picking, vegetable hunting, mushroom digging. When Toris was with her he'd forget about the dirt under his fingers and focus on the dirt underneath his toes, so soft and sweet, a reminder that the earth could be good and holy. When he was with her he'd forgot about the _then_ and focus on the _now_. He'd swirl it around his tongue like caramel, and so would Eduard and so would Raivis. When they were with her, they could forget about their lives and pretend that they were living. When they were with her, they _were_ living.

And then she got sick.

She was a strong woman, his mother. Aušra Laurinaitis bowed to no man, and certainly not a sickness. She said that she could take on anything. She said that she could take on the biggest grizzly bear and win, then flay its skin and eat its meat for breakfast. Once, she said that she fought the strongest man in the world and sent him crying to the other side of the continent with an imprint of her foot on his ass. Toris believed her. They all did.

But he was still a scared child back then. He was a _child_ back then. He felt the pangs of mortality when a flower died, or when the bird above the chimney fell dead from the roof. So his mother taught him a song. Short and simple, with words easy to remember. He can't remember when she taught it to him, or where. Only the slow, easy cadence of it, easily pliable beneath his lips.

 _May the sun of this land  
Scatter all the gloom and dark,  
With Truth and Light,  
Guiding our steps forever…_

She told him, _Whenever you are scared, sing this song. Its words are good and true, and it will always lead the way back home._

 _But mother,_ Eduard asked, _how can a song lead you home? Isn't that what a compass is for?_

Their mother winked at Eduard.

 _You'll find out when you're older._

Raivis sang the song over and over, especially when he was doing chores. His voice would float through the house, sweet and pure. Then Eduard would join in, with his smooth, supple voice, and so would Toris, weaving in his voice through the last few words and making the song whole again.

They sang, and they sang, and they sang. Whenever they needed a reminder of home, they sang.

And so did Toris when he was alone.

He sang that song many times over. Even when he forgot the words, even when he lost the melody, he continued to sing. He continued to sing, and he was reminded of home. He'd sing the fields, in the river, letting his voice flow through the world and through his body. He'd hum in a crowded street. In a wildflower garden. In a cabin in the woods while making bread. In the forest. In a cold, damp place. In a blooming hill full of poppies. In a bed before dawn, a bed with starchy sheets and hard pillows, a bed where the sound of his own heartbeat was too strong to ignore. A bed, although piled with quilts and blankets, that was farther from any home he'd ever known.

He sang, he sang, and he sang. Farther and farther away from all of the places his mother ever knew. He sang.

He sang in a lone country road, far from civilization and free from view, where a blond boy sat still in the dark.

* * *

It was late at night when the crown prince collapsed. He fell onto a tuft of timothy grass, where crickets lay and fireflies danced, and if he had fallen one inch to the left he would have cracked his head and died. But he didn't, and Toris saw this as a sign, a blessing in disguise for him. Then again, it could have just as easily been a curse for the crown prince.

The crown prince lay silent upon the ground, balanced on his shoulder, arms splayed out precariously. The only sound he made upon falling was a choked curse that fell underneath his breath and crumpled under the weight of his silence. Tiny tremors ran through his body. Toris, upon turning around and seeing this, did what any rational person would do: kneel by the crown prince's side and swallow down the panic.

His blood ran cold as he forced his brain to run rational overdrive. _The crown prince has collapsed. You must help him._ Only his brain didn't want to run into rational overdrive. It ran an anxious track around his body, then another, then another. With shaking hands he groped at his side for anything – a bag, a rope, a sword – and found that his clumsy fingers could not grasp without falling. Biting his cheek, Toris forced himself to yank one of the food bags open and fish out a random smaller one inside.

He was good at these things. He was good at handling tricky scenarios. So he didn't understand why there was such a rush of adrenaline running through him. He didn't understand why he felt so watched and vulnerable in the middle of the night when no one was around, and he didn't understand how he got here, and he didn't understand how he allowed things to get this way. But Toris quickly shoved those thoughts to the back of his mind, along with their cold flashes and shaky hand movements. It wasn't about him. Nothing was about him. For the crown prince was breathing shallowly, and on the ground, with his soiled nightclothes and greasy hair, he almost looked like a corpse.

Toris sat down. After sitting, he lifted the crown prince up and turned him over, placing his head on his thigh. He flinched after brushing the crown prince's hair out of his face. Toris's skin – clammy and cold – felt exactly like the crown prince's.

Toris placed the smaller bag of food by his side and untied it. He peered into it and would have sighed at the contents inside under normal circumstances. Birch bark. Familiar, dry, underwhelming. Only then, it was like unwrapping a bag of gold.

Toris took off the crown prince's mouth cloth, folded it in half, and practically flung it to the side. The crown prince's lips were in worse condition than ever. They were chapped and pale, with hints of what Toris mistook for blood in the late night light. He cursed, made a mental note to give the crown prince some water later, and, using his free hand, shook the crown prince's shoulder.

"You're sick," is what Toris said when the crown prince pursed his lips together in acknowledgement. "You need to eat."

The crown prince laughed a beat too late, breathy and dry, perhaps trying to be bitter. Toris could have sworn the corners of his lips turned up in a mocking half smile. "No."

Blood rushed through Toris's veins. "No!" With his free hand he frantically went through the smaller bag, grabbing as much birch bark as he could. "You have to eat. You're going to die!"

"Die…?" The crown prince trailed off. He seemed to roll the words in his mouth before continuing. "Maybe I want to die."

"No, you don't." Toris pressed. At that point, the line between convincing and pleading were hard to distinguish. "You have so many things left to live for. Your country. Your people. They all want you to live. _I_ want you to live."

The crown prince pushed away Toris's hand. He scooted himself up into a sitting position, only to slump into Toris's chest. Toris reached out another hand to support him, to hold him steady, but the crown prince pushed it away, too. "You want me to live." The crown prince sounded incredulous, just like before, and Toris would have been relieved if it wasn't for how the crown prince had to force the syllables out. "Say that again? You want _me_ to live? …Bullshit."

The crown prince's fists started shaking.

"You know why you want me to live? You know why? It's because I'm a thing to you. I'm just some _thing_ for you to sell and buy and make a profit out of. So you think hey, maybe I'll, like, kidnap the crown prince of my kingdom because it'll make me more popular, right? _Bullshit!_ " The crown prince was wheezing at this point, struggling to get the words off of his chest. Toris felt frozen. He watched as the crown prince's chest rose and fell, rose and fell. "Suddenly you're all, 'oh, I want you to live! Oh, you don't deserve to die! Oh, you need to eat!' You know what? I don't want to be kidnapped. _I don't want to be here._ But you have the nerve to tell me that _I_ have something to live for? That I shouldn't die even if I want to? When you were the one who took me against my will?"

The crown prince spat onto the ground. His voice, so loud and breathless earlier, lowered.

"I don't care about you." And his voice was so hollow, so eerily calm that Toris had no hesitations in believing him. "I want to die. I'd rather die than be in this hell. So take my mouth again. Take my eyes and my ears and my hands and my feet. Take every single part of me and burn it to ashes for all I care. But you won't take away my death."

There was a long pause filled with nothing but the sounds of crickets chirping, heaving breathing, and Toris's own heartbeat.

"You're wrong," Toris said, quietly.

"What?"

"You're wrong," He repeated.

"Wrong about what?" The crown prince asked. Agitation prickled out of his words.

Toris took a deep breath. In. Out. In. Out.

Damn being passive.

"I think you're afraid."

The statement sliced through the muggy night air, and the crown prince stiffened beside him.

"Afraid?"

The crown prince swiveled before him, carrying a half-bared teeth half-quivering snarl on his face, like a lance ready for the burying. "I'm not scared of you," he said, but his tone lacked conviction. And the snarl was slipping.

"Not of me," Toris said, and he paused. He liked how the words slid between his teeth, but he wasn't sure if they were sugar sweet or poison pure. He breathed, decided that they were both, and bit into the pomegranate teeth first. "I think you're afraid of dying. You are a prince. When I… kidnapped you," the word was hard to say, hard to admit to, and he had to push past all of the seeds in his mouth to spit the rind out, "I took your independence, too. You can't do anything without independence. You can't eat, you can't sleep, you can't breathe. You can't walk without it. Am I right?"

Toris swore he saw a fraction of a nod from the crown prince.

He continued. "You move, but you don't feel. You chew, but you don't eat. You survive…"

Toris shut his eyes. He thought of black cellars, screaming merchants, and the sound of a lance ripping through flesh.

"…But you don't live."

When he opened his eyes again, Toris saw the crown prince's mouth pressed tight against itself.

The snarl was gone.

"So you do anything you can do, even if it is harmful. It's still you. You decided to die because it is the only thing you have left." Toris said, and he didn't like the way it fell so _heavy_ , a gavel pounding on wood. Suddenly, the scene left him with chills. He didn't like how his voice sounded, so authoritative, and he didn't like sitting in the middle of the plains, so vulnerable to sight and people and animals. He didn't like wearing plain clothes. He didn't like stripping the crown prince's armor.

He didn't like stripping his own.

The crown prince still hadn't responded, so Toris continued on.

"I think you're making a hasty decision."

The crown prince stirred. He craned his neck up at Toris, and would have made face to face contact with him if he hadn't crumpled. "I think you're _being an ass_."

Toris's face flushed bright red. "It's not your decision."

"Not my decision—"

"It isn't," Toris insisted, and continued insisting even when the crown prince protested. He turned redder, but instead of putting him down, making him curl into the wall, Toris felt a rush of blood pumping through his veins. "It isn't. To you, there are no other options. There's no choice. When there's no choice, you take the first option you see. It isn't a decision, it's a must. A must that you haven't thought out fully. You're throwing your life away."

"Throwing my life away?" The crown prince's lip curled. "I'm protecting it from disgusting people like you."

"There's no need to rebel this way."

"Death is the only rebellion left."

"No, it isn't!"

"Stop it!" The crown prince yelled, and Toris flinched back both from the volume and the suddenness of it. "You think you can manipulate me into staying alive? You think you can make me believe that you care? You can't! You don't! I refuse to be one of your stupid little pawns in this game!"

" _You're not just a pawn!_ "

The crickets stopped chirping. The world shifted, froze and unfroze, turned red and black and every color in between.

He raised his voice at the crown prince. Him, Toris Laurinaitis.

He just raised his voice at the crown prince.

Toris didn't realize that he was shaking so violently until he looked at his hands. For a moment he couldn't speak, only look and look and look at his hands – with his fingers, long and callused and trembling like sticks.

He was tired. He was so tired.

He was tired of being passive. He was tired of pretending not to care.

 _Sorry, Natalya. The one time I'm being selfish… and it's for another person._

(She'd slap him when he'd return. Not that he would mind.)

"You are a human being. You need to eat foods you like. You need to sleep on a nice bed. You need a proper death in a proper cemetery surrounded by people you love. Most of all, you need this with independence. No independence means no life. And you won't get independence if you're dead."

Toris swallowed, hard.

"You need to live. You are not just a son or a prince, Feliks Łukasiewicz. Even though I was the one who kidnapped you, even though I took away your independence and everything else, I don't see you as just a pawn. You are a person. Your life is important! You have dreams like the rest of us. You are made of the same flesh and blood and bone. You have thoughts and feelings and emotions, and though you hate me, I… I understand how you feel. I know what it's like to be afraid. I was afraid, once." _I am afraid now_. "It isn't always like this. And, if it is… there's no point in throwing your life away to something that can be changed. You'll do more alive than dead. And you don't need to throw your life away on me. For some reason, you've been alive for this long. You deserve to survive for longer, and you deserve to thrive, and you deserve to get somewhere far, far away from here. You deserve to _live._ "

He took a deep breath.

"You aren't protecting your life. If anything, you're doing the opposite. So please… reconsider what you are doing."

A weight lifted off of Toris's shoulder. He slumped back, exhausted, and pressed a shuddering hand to his lips.

He was paranoid, of course. Sitting there at the dead of night, with nothing but the moon lighting his way, Toris felt a chill creep up his spine. Immediately, he was barraged with thoughts – he said too much, he shouldn't have said this, he shouldn't have said anything at all – and his heart raced. He had to choke down a ball of some emotion welling up in his throat. But.

He talked back to the crown prince. Told him what he was thinking, nothing held back.

And for some reason, it felt good.

The crown prince was quiet. Toris studied his face in the light. He watched as his lips pressed and pursed, and he watched as the crown prince bit his lower lip. Was that expression… confusion?

His response was short. Short, and blunt… and quiet.

"What's the point in living if you know you'll die at the end?"

Toris thought about that. Gods, he'd thought about it so many times in the past.

He asked himself every day.

"At least you can say you tried."

Another pause, heavier than the last.

"You'll, like, use me."

Toris hesitated.

A part of him wondered why the crown prince's voice was so small.

"Staying alive when someone wants you dead is the greatest act of rebellion."

There was a long, heavy silence. Toris felt the weight of the crown prince pressing against his legs. He felt the grass underneath his feet, and the wind brushing against his ear, singing a midnight lullaby into it. He could almost fall asleep, really, if he wanted.

The crown prince's lips pursed, though not harshly like before. They were pursed like a child's, deep in thought. His nose twitched.

Toris stood up. The crown prince almost fell over.

"You need to get rest." Toris said curtly, though he knew he himself wasn't going to get much rest. He bent down and brushed the grass off of his pants, smacking it loudly, harshly, because really, he didn't know what to do with his hands. Then, after securing the crown prince's mouth cloth (not too tightly) and a moment's consideration, he placed the opened bag of birch bark in the crown prince's lap, right by his hands.

"The birch bark is here. Goodnight."

That night, Toris Laurinaitis covered himself with his burlap sack blanket and gazed up at the stars.

He did not sleep for hours.

That morning, Toris awoke to the sound of buzzing in his ear. He woke up in a panic, thinking that it was a stampede or the swish of a horse's tail or _something_. Blankets flying, limbs moving, hand flying to his sword –

It was the buzz of a mayfly.

After blinking the sleep from his eyes and taking in the bleariness of early morning, he started in on his morning routine. Fold the blanket. Press it into his bag. Stretch. Turn around and check on the crown prince.

The crown prince was sleeping, as usual, only this time he was sleeping upright. His head was bowed low, hair in front of his eyes. Toris stepped over to him slowly, so as not to disturb his peace. After the conversation of the previous night, he didn't think he wanted to disturb the peace. The thought of having a conversation when the crown prince knew all of his vulnerabilities irked him. No, not irked. It unsettled him.

He scanned the crown prince, searching for any signs of injury or harm when…

Oh.

The birch bark.

Toris peered at the small bag. Was it just him, or was it sagging lower than it usually did? Perhaps it was a trick of the light. The morning spread convincing shadows over the plains, ones that even spooked the bravest of knights. But…

Toris widened his eyes in shock. Around the crown prince, spat out by his left thigh, was a pile of coarse strings. They were light brown and very damp.

He grabbed the birch bark bag and peered into it.

It was completely empty.

* * *

 **Holy shit! After three chapters, they interact again! After three chapters, _Toris Laurinaitis and Feliks_** **_Łukasiewicz actually interact!_**

 **I know. I was shocked, too. Ahaha... and so it begins. The end of Arc I of Knight Unexpected, six+ chapters of filler and exposition (lololol), and the start of the actual story.** **In hindsight I probably should've gotten all of the exposition done way earlier, but... this fic will be a learning experience, I guess. I'll take it in stride.**

 **I really hope I got Toris's character down. ;_;; Feliks is pretty easy to write. He has a distinct voice and personality. But Toris is harder because of his niceness... which isn't a bad thing, really, because he has a lot of inner conflict about said niceness, but. I'll get to that later. Anyways.**

 **So yeah. Toris and Feliks are going to interact a lot more from here on out. Consider this chapter the first building block of their relationship. And believe me... there's gonna be a lot of relationship. I'm a sucker for slow burn and these two are as slow burn as you can get, so their development is gonna be pretty fun to watch and write. :)**

 **Next comes Chapter Seven, which is one of the first major chapters I ever planned out, so be prepared for that. Hold on tight for that one because. Oh boy. It's gonna be wild. Then comes Chapter Eight, which marks the end of Arc I. I'll probably take a mini-hiatus after Chapter Eight, just to write this one thing I've been thinking of and to solidify some ideas. When I come back from this possible hiatus, though, the ball's gonna be rolling. I'm excited to see where this fic will take me.**

 **That's all I have for this update. Feel free to leave a review or a PM if you'd like - critique and advice is always welcome. My tumblr ask box is open 24/7, so if you want to send something there you can, too.**

 **As always, thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed this chapter of Knight Unexpected. Peace out!**

 **-NC**

 **tumblr: nonbinarymage**

 **fic tag: fic: knight unexpected**

 **Edit: I FORGOT TO MENTION - the song Toris's mom teaches him is part of the Lithuanian national anthem, _Tautiška giesmė._**

 **Also, I'm uploading this fic to archiveofourown! :D Same title, same summary, but my username there is marcorooniandcheese. Check it out there if you'd like!**

* * *

9-3-17

Hello.

It's been six months since I've last updated this story, and during that time I have both grown and fallen as an author. I've grown in that I've taken a hard look at this story and have recognized its flaws, its imperfections, all of the things that made it beautiful when I first started writing and now make it old and obsolete. I was proud of those things, once. I still am. They were accomplishments that a young NC could only dream of achieving, and for that I am grateful. However, with age comes introspection and maturity, and those things that I was (and still am) proud of now come with their deal of embarrassment and cringe. I've fallen – or perhaps risen, depending on your take on it - in that after taking a look at all of these flaws, I've recognized one very important thing about myself: I no longer want to write _Knight Unexpected_ in the way I originally plotted it.

Let's face it. The writing is clunky at best, monotonous at worst. Toris's internal monologues go on and on and on for so long that they grow repetitive. The characterization is all over the place. Though I tried my best with Feliks and felt that I handled him well at the time, now I feel as if he grows too trusting too fast. Same with Toris. The worldbuilding is shallow, full of plot holes and unanswered inconsistencies. Lastly… it's too slow. Honestly, young NC had no idea how to pace anything. (I still don't know how to pace anything. Now I'm just better at hiding it.) :^/c

Most of all…

The story got boring to write.

Although I hold this story near and dear to my heart, I've come to realize that I only kept writing for the sake of finishing it and not for the sake of telling the story. The original plot is just plain tedious. I thought it would be fun when I first started writing, but after the third or so chapter I began to realize that it was not as fun as I thought it was – and instead it became way more stifling. So stifling, in fact, that I motivated myself to get through the story with the thought of writing a few fleeting, exciting scenes that happen later on. I procrastinated on writing those boring scenes, and because of that I was kept from writing anything for a good number of months. I didn't want to write anything that wasn't _Knight Unexpected_ , but that only hurt me as a writer and a person. Knight Unexpected has been holding me back for so long. Trying to complete it has kept me from starting other projects that I have more inspiration for. At some point, I came to realize that I was treating this story more like a job than the passion project it should be. And I shouldn't treat it that way. Both you and I and the story itself deserve more respect than that.

I want to come back to writing. True writing. I want to come back to the days when I would write stories for fun, not because I felt obligated to finish them. I've been dying to write an aforementioned handful of scenes for two years now. Yes, I had them plotted out since the very beginning. Yes, they would be satisfying to write. But are they worth dragging myself through a repetitive work that I have no more inspiration for? Of course not. I miss the days when writing renewed and invigorated me, and I am eager to return to them wholeheartedly, with my whole effort. And to do that, I need to let go of this work. I need to take a breather and remind myself of why I really started writing and telling stories in the first place.

Maybe those scenes will appear in some other work, or maybe I'll write them out as standalone fics. They will, however, never appear in the original _Knight Unexpected_.

As of 9-3-17, I am putting _Knight Unexpected_ on hiatus. It's been a good two years, but I'm ready to move on. To everyone who has reviewed, favorited, and followed this story, I'm truly sorry that I never got to finish it, and I truly apologize for it. However, as a person who is both concerned for themselves and the wellbeing of their readers, I must leave this story be for a long while. I would rather indulge myself and my readers in a passion project that I wholeheartedly love rather than attempt to drag myself through a stale, dead end project.

Thank you all so, so much for your lovely reviews. Seeing the review notification in my inbox was honestly one of the highlights of this fic's short career. Don't worry – you can still leave reviews if you wish. I won't delete this fic. It has too much sentimental value for me to take off the Internet. In a few years, maybe I'll look back at this fic and laugh at the clunkiness of my writing. I hope I will. I hope to write for a good, long time after this.

Thank you all so, so much for your support. I love you all. However, I won't say goodbye. Rather, I'll say see you later. Because, you see…

Originally, my desire to finish this fic was what kept me from bringing out this new idea. But I've been dwelling on it for a while. And I've decided to say fuck it.

After a long, good hiatus, I will bring back _Knight Unexpected_ with the same general rivalry idea, but a different plot. It'll be an actual dynamic plot that isn't just Toris monologuing about walking. Shocking, I know. I wish I would have done this sooner, but! It isn't too late now. Believe me, I still want to write about fantasy LietPol – just not in the way I originally intended. _Knight Unexpected's_ original incarnation is better as a purely self-indulgent, self-kept AU. The revision I have in mind will be both a pleasure to write and to read. I can assure you all of that.

So adieu, farewell, see you again soon, my dear readers. It was a pleasure to have all of you come on this two year journey with me, and it will be a pleasure to meet you all again when I've become a better, happier, more self-indulgent writer who loves their craft again. Let's meet under happier skies.

Until we meet again.

Peace out!

-NC

P.S. As always, my tumblr is nonbinarymage. Send me an ask or an IM if you have any burning questions about the fic that I haven't addressed.


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